Mayor Bob Coble / 2008 file photo by Brad Warthen
Columbia Mayor Bob Coble has sent this op-ed submission to The State in response to a piece by Jeff Wilkinson today headlined, “Innovista still short on private money:”
Innovista will create jobs and raise per capita income
Dear Editor,
I wanted to respond to Jeff Wilkinson’s Sunday article “Innovista still short on private money.” Despite the delays caused by the current recession and financial crisis, Innovista will be the Columbia region’s greatest opportunity to create jobs and increase our per capita income. USC President Dr. Harris Pastides appointed the highly respected businessman Don Herriott to head up Innovista in January. While we knew creating a research campus would be a challenging and a long-term process, I think it is important to remember the crucial economic development reasons why Innovista and the entire effort of Columbia and the University of South Carolina to enter the knowledge economy is critical to our economic future.
In February 2003 Columbia adopted our regional technology plan. We created Engenuity, a coalition of leaders from the public, higher education and the private sector to implement the plan. Dr. Sorensen announced his vision to build a research campus in downtown Columbia in late 2003. In December of 2004 The State Editorial said that the USC research campus would “likely reshape the whole city.” In April of 2006, USC, the Guignard family and the City unveiled a master plan for the 500 acres in downtown from Innovista to the waterfront. The State of South Carolina was the key catalyst for this progress with the creation of the Life Sciences Act and the Endowed Chairs. Last year USC announced that the Darla Moore School of Business would be located in the heart of Innovista.
The State conducted a poll you published on March 7th on City election issues. The poll showed remarkable support for Innovista by City residents. On the question of whether Columbia should provide financial assistance to the University of South Carolina’s Innovista research center 63% supported Innovista.
The first phase of Innovista with two buildings at the Horizon Center and the Discovery Center is complete, as are the two parking garages built by the City of Columbia and Richland County, representing an investment of over $140 million. The Association of University Technology Managers recently ranked USC number 11 out of 114 public universities in the number of start-up businesses created.
The National Hydrogen Association Convention this past March at the Convention Center and the opening of the new Columbia Hydrogen Fueling Station were important steps forward in Columbia’s efforts to enter the knowledge and green economy. The delegates, from all over the world, were very enthusiastic about Columbia’s friendly hospitality and the community’s knowledge of hydrogen and fuel cells, including the research going on at USC under the leadership of Dr. Harris Pastides.
We know we must work to insure that our entire diverse population benefits from the knowledge and green economy. Engenuity began working with the Greater Columbia Chamber of Commerce, New Carolina and Columbia Opportunity Resource on the Columbia Talent Magnet project. Over 8000 students graduate from a Columbia institution of higher education each year. The Talent Magnet project is designed to keep these bright minds in the Columbia region by connecting them to existing community initiatives. Also, the USC Columbia Technology Incubator has assisted 63 companies and created 668 new jobs including 174 minority and female jobs.
Even during these tough economic times, I am confident that Innovista will be the driving force in building a strong new economy with more jobs and an increase in our per capita income.Mayor Bob Coble
By the way, on a recent post Doug (who HATES Innovista) triumphantly quoted Don Herriott from this section of Jeff’s story:
The 60-year-old ex-Roche pharmaceuticals executive said the concept of Innovista should move from a pre-built campus intended to attract blue-chip companies like IBM and Intel, to growing local companies in existing incubators and commercial space already available throughout downtown.
In baseball terms, he wants to play small ball.
“We swung for the fences and we struck out,” he said. “Now we want to hit a lot of singles. The goal is to win the game.”
So far, with the only significant non-state money being the $35 million pitched in by Columbia and Richland County to build the two adjacent parking garages, taxpayers, not the market, have been supporting the campus, critics say.
The thing is, I hear Mr. Herriott talk small ball, and I nod. Where I get confused is on the swinging for the fences thing. I never understood Innovista to be about that. I had the impression all along that the game was about putting together base hits, walks, bunts, steals and the occasional sac fly to score runs, one at a time.
I thought the planners would have been delighted to land an IBM or Intel, but more because it would have bought credibility and time among the broader public that doesn’t appreciate small ball. You know how the crass general public loves home runs. (Home runs, of course, are not what baseball is about, properly understood. It’s about base hits. So is life.) It would cause the crowd to shout down the Dougs in the community, and give the team several innings in which to amass runs the respectable way.
But fine. Mr. Herriott has made the same decision regarding Innovista that Lindsey Graham and John McCain made regarding Guantanamo: There’s nothing wrong with it, but the public perception is that it’s a bad thing, so agree with the public perception, close it and continue the mission. Since the news coverage has obsessed about the “spec” buildings rather than Innovista as a concept, agree with the public perception. Say “we were swinging for the fences, and we’re not going to do that any more.” And continue the mission. (That’s considered smart in the game of perception these days — far better than stonewalling and sticking to one’s guns. The Vatican is catching hell right now for not following the modern script. People say the Pope should just say he was wrong and apologize abjectly and move on, and modernists don’t understand why he doesn’t do that. He doesn’t do it because he doesn’t think he acted wrongly, apparently. And in today’s secular world, that’s unforgivable.)
The bottom line is that Innovista remains what I’ve always thought it was. As I said in a comment on an earlier post: It’s an idea. It’s a movement. It’s a vision, one which many investors, scientists, entrepreneurs, technicians, inventors, data processors, landlords and others will have to buy into over a long period of time — at least a generation — for the vision to be realized.
Just a couple more weeks of Mayor Bob’s sunshine pumping machine and then it’ll be retired.
So Mr. Herriott told you he’s just playing word games when he says Innvista V1.0 was a failure? or is this just your interpretation of his motivation? If it’s the latter, than you’re just pumping the same sunshine that Walter references.
You need to go back to what the politicians who came up with Innovista specifically said it would do. Then you need to look at what it actually did and how the plan was executed. Changing the objective on the fly doesn’t change the history.
As for the baseball metaphor, so far Innovista has been a three base error, a passed ball, a wild pitch, and a strikeout. And then they raised the ticket prices.
Exactly. And what you described has happened in the top half of the first inning. The difference between you and me is that you’re declaring defeat and want to send the whole team to the showers and declare the season lost, while I’m aware that the first game just started. It’s the beginning of April, and everything is possible.
You keep pretending that $100 million dollars wasn’t spent already. In some people’s minds, that’s a lot of money. I know in your mind, a tax dollar is an imaginary thing (mainly because it’s coming out of someone else’s pocket).
And again, did Mr. Herriott tell you he was just playing word games or was that your guess?
When my son plays baseball, they have a mercy rule that the game is over when you’re ten runs behind after 5 innings. The score is 10-0 in the first inning now. The Innovista team has to start scoring some runs and pitching a shutout going forward to win.
1. It’s my money every bit as much as it’s yours, or anybody else’s. And this is something I want it spent on.
2. I didn’t say he was playing word games. Nothing of the kind. I said he’d reached the same tactical conclusion as McCain and Graham on Gitmo: You go ahead and do what you were going to do anyway, but you talk about it in a way that helps to neutralize critics. It’s something that I’m generally too stubborn to do myself, but something that lots of smart people do in order to move on beyond the shouting. It’s not dishonest, unless you really believe it’s the wrong thing to do.
3. Doug, the game just started, according to any measure you choose. USC just changed pitchers, and you’re telling me he’s looking good, and yet you want to declare it a loss before he’s done with his first batter? Sorry, but this analogy is all on my side…
Will your publishing of Mayor Coble’s op-ed preclude THE STATE from running the piece? Ms. Scoppe has made it clear to me op-eds won’t be published if they appear elsewhere in media.
All I want to know is when dollar beer night is…
I don’t know… I hope that doesn’t happen. I’m sort of counting on the fact that Cindi doesn’t read my blog. She used to, when it was part of her job, but I think she’s too busy now…
You raise an interesting question, though. I hesitated to publish this, because I didn’t want to seem to be trying to scoop The State when Bob intended for it to be published there. But then there was the fact that if I were to refer to it, I wanted to use the whole thing — and if I waited until it was in The State, I’d feel funny about whether I had the right to do so. Not that anybody would get on my case about it, but that I want to be above reproach on this, like Caesar’s wife. I wouldn’t want to give anybody at the paper even the slightest grounds to make such a complaint. We laid-off people can be touchy, you know.
Also, I knew that a couple of years back, McClatchy started making everyone at all papers get contributors signing a statement assigning all rights to the newspaper company. I wanted to run it before that sort of agreement was in effect on this piece.
Anyway, if the effect is that Bob doesn’t get the forum he’d sought, I’ll be sorry…
Oh, and David — you and me both, brother.
This whole metaphor is confused by the fact that you actually CAN watch baseball in a very fine new ballpark that, by the way, is considered part of the Innovista concept of transforming that part of town.
As for beer, I don’t know. I haven’t been to a game there yet (I’m still sulking because the USC athletic department refused to work with a minor league team to share the park, thereby running off our prospect to get a AAA team). But recently Charles Bierbauer Tweeted that he was in the stands on a beautiful. I Tweeted him back to ask if you could get beer there, and his reply was vague: “a guy like you who knows his way around could get a beer at that ballpark…”
So would I have to bring my own cooler, or find someone who did, or what?
@ Walter–Bully to the sunshine pumping! I lived in a place with gloom-and-doom, low self-esteem—Maine, and it is a downer, and many opportunities get missed because a place sells itself short. You have to give SC and Columbia credit for trying to be all that they can be, as they see it…..
Kathryn, I’ll give USC credit, but not much because because all they’ve done so far is spend a bunch of money on a couple empty buildings. Call it “gloom-and-doom”, I’ll call it “fact”.
I’ve been involved with USC for nearly 20 years and had my input in the Innovista. The dog and pony show appeared to have USC headed in the right direction, sounded good when brought forward to the Board of Directors and the USC general population. In reality it’s imploded on them and speaking of which, the only successful part of the whole dream has been the implosion of the old Carolina Plaza. Andrew Sorenson is one hell of a salesman, and wears a bowtie instead of white patent leather shoes and belt.
The project is WAY, WAY, WAY behind schedule and at this point it appears the plane is stuck at the terminal and only a matter of time before the flight is canceled. I’ve seen may successful large scale projects and I’ve seen many failures… Innovista has more in common with the failures at this point and I don’t see anything to suddenly change the course.
I’m now questioning how long these two top-tier researchers will stick around, both having been lied to and have been extremely patient. Both have every right to pick up and leave, and they could write their ticket to just about anywhere in the country. They were promised state of the art research facilities and are stuck in basements and reorganized storage rooms of rundown buildings on campus. In a law firm it’d be like being promised a corner office during an interview and then being given a janitor’s closet once you’ve accepted the position.
You can count on my prediction, within the next three years… USC will move into these buildings and use both of them for classrooms and office space.
Long time reader, first time poster here. Brad, I always enjoyed your editorials with The State, and I’m glad you are continuing to make your voice heard through this blog.
Since Day One, I have been one of the most stanuch supporters of Innovista, and I will continue to be. In my opinion, even if Innovista turns out to be the biggest failure since the Maginot Line, it would still have been worth the risk. Yes, spending $100 million was a risk, but without risk, you get no return. I see Innovista as a major calculated risk. It’s not foolish to think that Columbia can be a center for research. But, to make this vision a reality, you have to make investments and take chances. For 200 years, Columbia has never risked anything, and we’ve been a government town, and nothing more. This is our one chance to turn Columbia into more than that. And I do believe this is our best, if not our only chance, to “make something of ourselves.” Because, if Innovista fails, then we can assume that Research, Science and Technology jobs will never be abundant is Columbia (because if they are abundant, then then Innovista has succeeded.) So, if we don’t have Science and Technogy jobs here, what kind of jobs are we going to have? Agriculture? No. Manufacturing? No. Distribution Centers. No. What is our local economy going to be based on 25-30 years from now, other than government and the military? Innovista is a long-termvision, and it doesn’t happen overnight. Our biggest problem is that we have waited entirely too long to get in the ballgame when it comes to building a knowledge economy. So, should we just not even try, and continue to fall behind other states? Or should we at least take the risk?
For the third time… did Mr. Herriott TELL YOU “he’d reached the same tactical conclusion as McCain and Graham on Gitmo” or is that your GUESS?
You are presenting it as if you know for a fact that Mr. Herriott is doing that and I am asking you a simple question: HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT?
If it’s you making a guess, then say so. If you spoke to him, then say so. There’s a big difference.
Chill, Doug — it hadn’t occurred to me that you were serious about that question, since I have in no way indicated that I’ve spoken with him. Is it really not clear that I’m inferring, based upon the same info that’s available to you? Gee. I liked it better when we were talking baseball…
This is your quote:
“But fine. Mr. Herriott has made the same decision regarding Innovista that Lindsey Graham and John McCain made regarding Guantanamo: There’s nothing wrong with it, but the public perception is that it’s a bad thing, so agree with the public perception, close it and continue the mission. ”
In what way does that show that you are “inferring” anything? You don’t write “I believe…” or “In my opinion”… you make a statement with absolutely no basis in fact to try and downplay Herriott’s statement to fit your own pie-in-the-sky perception of Innovista.
What if Mr. Herriott actually meant exactly what he said – that Innovista has been a disaster up to this point and he doesn’t intend to repeat the same mistakes? Maybe it will take someone with real world experience to make lemonade out the lemons he’s been handed.
Sigh. Doug, you ever take a Myers-Briggs test? I sense that you are an S, while I am strongly N…
Anyway, I’m going to close my laptop and watch the rest of an exciting basketball game.
Night, all…
I assume strong N means you have the powers of ESP to know what other people are thinking? Or does it mean Never Admit I’m Wrong?
It means iNtuitive. And people who are the opposite (Sensing) would probably say scornfully that it “means you have the powers of ESP to know what other people are thinking.”
People who are N hate doing mathematical proofs, because they can tell that angle A is congruent to angle B without going through 10 steps to test it. We tend to perceive things holistically, all at once, rather than building a picture from constituent elements and reaching a conclusion gradually.
People who are N really drive people who are S nuts, because they see us as irresponsible, drawing conclusions on the basis of insufficient information. They get downright indignant about it.
Here’s my results on Meyers Briggs… I didn’t see an N:
ISTJ – “Trustee”. Decisiveness in practical affairs. Guardian of time- honored institutions. Dependable. 11.6% of total population.
I’m an INTP. The P part probably also drives you crazy, being a J. J’s make up their minds and that’s it. Ps are constantly re-evaluating the information coming in. But I’m not extreme in that regard; I’m sort of on the cusp. But I’m WAY N, and WAY I…
We’re only 3.3 percent of the population. So there are way more of you. I was the only INTP among the managers in The State’s newsroom back in the day, which explained a lot to those who had to work with me…
My husband and most of his colleagues are INTP–and once you get to know them all (and that is a prerequisite), they are delightful. Interestingly, the Myers-Briggs folks will tell you INTPs that you will most likely want to see all the data behind the test and its validity.
I am an ENFJ–with a strong tempering b/c of my law training. I just make stuff up because it sounds good. Seriously, we are especially good at selling intangible things (we make the best pastors, supposedly)
Welcome, Ryan!
ENFJ? So… you need validation regarding your habit of jumping to conclusions based on your feelings, and once you’ve jumped, there’s no going back.
Do I have that right?
And yes, absolutely: Welcome, Ryan!
I prefer to make my decisions based on “mercy” instead of “justice,” and I don’t let things drag on forever and ever. I do have a significant tempering, as I said, as a result of my legal education.
One of the nice things about Myers=Briggs is that it’s all good–but they really stress that it is a good idea to develop one’s opposing sides. Hence, I slow down and check my work, and try to check my gut with some logic.
I’m only slightly “extraverted” as they spell it, but strongly F. I suspect it is why I am a liberal.
Another big point they make with your type is that you can come across cold and smug to people who are not admitted into the inner circle. Certainly my husband’s teaching reviews have reflected this from time to time. It’s always funny to me when friends who only know him socially see him give a professional talk. It’s two different people. As an Extravert, I am pretty much the same with everyone.
FYI, The State DID run Mayor Bob’s op-ed this morning, in spite of the fact that I ran it here. So I feel better. I didn’t want to think I’d sabotaged his chance to get it into print.
Oh, and you know who called that to my attention? Don Herriott. I ran into him at the Cap City Club this morning. I thought I’d better mention that, since Doug keeps asking if I’ve talked to him. Well, this morning I did. But only for a minute.
And Kathryn, I do well with crowds. It’s only when you get to know me up close and personal that I seem cold and smug.
And no, I’m NOT going to put one of those smiley faces there to tell people I’m kidding. We don’t do things like that.
Here’s a fun bit of trivia — call up that photo of Bob and zoom in on it. Note that little backup editorial next to his left ear. It’s about the trade deal with Colombia, and is therefore obviously written by me…
Did you have time to tell Mr. Herriott, “Let me tell you what you mean when you talk about Innovista”?