When I was up in Cleveland conducting a workshop at John Carroll University I heard a word running throughout the city that I did not expect -- entrepreneurship.
Cleveland and other rust belt cities are looking to bolster their entrepreneurial economies.
More and more are looking to non-profit incubators to help. From Philanthropy News Digest:
One such nonprofit is five-year-old Jumpstart, Inc., which provides seed money to entrepreneurs with promising businesses in the Cleveland area. Like a venture capital firm, Jumpstart identifies companies to invest in and advises them on their next steps. But in a departure from the traditional venture capital model, Jumpstart relies on charitable donations, many of them from the private sector, for its financing and does not return a share of profits to those who provide the investment dollars. Instead, returns come in the form of satisfaction derived from boosting the region's economic standing and future.
This is a much more prudent strategy than throwing money at corporate relocations that rarely offer the economic return they promise.
(Thanks to Jose Gonzalez for passing this along).
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