Timing Isn’t Everything, COURAGE Is.

In my posts on Building New Cleveland and on Having the COURAGE to Get Involved, I suggested that we should use the stimulus dollars to invest in a differentiated asset for Northeast Ohio - something that can form the basis for a regional advantage in the global economy.  As some of the comments and a number of emails I have received show, the temptation is always to wait until the picture "becomes clearer."  After all, it reduces your risk if you can see someone else do it first.  That's comforting, isn't it?  Less risk sounds good.  We could, after all, just create some temporary jobs by repairing some highways with the stimulus dollars.  We would get a few years of benefit out of that, wouldn't we?

Let me be clear about my position:  if we spend the majority of stimulus dollars on repair of existing infrastructure, or on the creation of some common new pieces of infrastructure (ex. "smart" highways) we will be leaving a legacy of regional decline to our children.  Only if we create a unique asset that gives us regional advantage in a global economy will the stimulus dollars change the future.

Leadership Means Acting, and Acting First

When Ohio built the Ohio and Erie canal in the 1820's it brought cheap, fast, reliable transportation to the region.  Building the canal was an act of leadership, because the businesses that would use it did not exist yet, and farmers were not clamoring for a canal that would open up markets from Canada to New Orleans for them.  The business, and economic, and political leaders of the time studied economic foundations.  They understood the importance of a sustainable economy, and they understood the impact of a transportation system on an economy.  They were relentless in trying to build the asset for the region, refusing to be defeated when the federal government declined to fund the canal.  They were willing to educate themselves and to lead the state into acting first with its own financial resources.   That's leadership.

What If They Had Waited?

Within 30 years, something happened.  A new technology was developed.  A more egalitarian "canal," one capable of giving opportunity to any town in the United States, regardless of that town's location; one that did not require a water source, or a particular regional geography - the railroad.

By the 1850's, railroads could bring fast, reliable, inexpensive transportation to the economy of ANY town.  This meant that no region could use it as the basis for a competitive advantage - it helped every town's economy grow faster.  (It was just a BIG disadvantage if the railroad passed you by.)

If it weren't for the canal, Cleveland would  have been the 45th largest city in the U.S., competing on an even basis with its peers when the railroads arrived.  What then?  Durham, SC was founded in 1853 as a railroad depot.  It was the beneficiary of the economic benefits brought by the new railroad technology.  Durham is less than half of Cleveland's size today, ranking as the 87th largest city in the U.S.  If any city demonstrates the result of waiting until a new technology has been broadly implemented, Durham does.  Simply put - to wait is to  let others take the advantage.)

Timing isn't Everything, COURAGE Is.

Because Cleveland was already the 5^th-largest city in the U.S, it was able to capitalize on the railroads and grow even faster.  While I don't know what innovations will spur the next round of global growth, I can predict Cleveland's fate.  If we have the courage to act first, we will give ourselves an advantage.  We will get ahead before the next round of global connectedness kicks in.  But it will take bold leadership.  We must act, and we must act first, at public scale.  I don't believe that success is the result of luck of timing.  Time and time again, we see that those who have the courage to act first gain the advantage.  Success is leadership, not timing.  It is courage.

Do you want to get involved in building New Cleveland?  Make ONE phone call, write ONE letter or email to a business leader or government official.  Ask them to make sure we're spending the stimulus dollars on a real basis for a new economy.  You'll be placing a brick in the foundation of New Cleveland.

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