Research University as Economic Developer?

Let there be no question about it - higher education, particularly research universities, are the captains of economic development in today’s economy.  In an era of shrinking government budgets, retrenched corporate profits, consolidated philanthropic investment in not-for-profits, and overstretched municipal budgets, colleges and universities are a consistent source of projects that stoke the economies of local communities.  Nary a “host community” (town gown lingo for a research university’s home town) in America is without some sort of “innovation” agenda pinned on the economic futures of its patron saint research universities.

Take for example the Greater Boston area, home to over 40 colleges and universities.  Here, innovation, like politics, has gained elevated status of not only serious business but almost professional sport.  The city of Boston has staked the economic future of the South Boston waterfront on the innovation economy (dubbing the area the “Innovation District”) and is actively courting research university anchor tenants to domicile beside Vertex Pharmaceuticals’ under-construction corporate campus and the fledgeling start-up sector.  Cambridge, home to both Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (ranked #1 and #2 research university in the world, respectively) is the area’s proverbial 800-pound gorilla with more technology and biotechnology companies per square mile in the world in its Kendall Square district.  Ask any Kendall Square company or property owner what drives their desire to be in Cambridge and the answer is flatly the same - proximity to MIT and Harvard. 

What’s different today than perhaps years past?  Today’s policy darling of economic development nationwide is the “idea economy”, and ideas are the research university’s stock in trade.  While, there will always be town gown kerfluffles between a research institute looking to expand and its host community, perhaps more so than in a generation is there a sense that a community stifles its research university’s growth at its own peril.

This sine qua non of development is leading to extraordinary public policy results.  Take, for example, New York City’s approach to the redevelopment of Roosevelt Island.  Long the forgotten, red-headed stepchild of New York districts, the city, in a brazen display of urban planning chutzpah, decided to transform the Island a la Kendall Square into a research university-hubbed innovation zone.  Through a lengthy and thorough RFP process, it selected the Cornell University-Technion Israel Institute of Technology collaborative to terraform the Island with research space, housing, commercial space...the whole works.  The city is backing the project not only with land but also $100 million in capital.  10-15 years ago, this would have been considered a university “land grab” (witness the Harvard University Allston-Brighton debacle in 2000).  Today, this is considered shrewd urban planning and economic development.

Another example is MIT’s public-private partnership” with the federal government to build a $450 million research facility at Hanscom Air Force Base in Bedford, MA, adjacent to the Institute’s Lincoln Laboratory in Lexington, MA.  MIT has long, deep relationships with the military and federal government - at one point, during World War II, nearly one-quarter of the country’s physicists were on MIT’s payroll.  Microwave radar, synthetic quinine, the gyroscope, the Internet, and other war time discoveries can all trace their roots to MIT and programs like DARPA.  In some respects, then, a deepening relationship through Hanscom Air Force Base is no surprise.  But a half-billion dollar research center is nothing to sneeze at.  Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown revealingly stated that the “public-private partnership could be a model for other Massachusetts installations and bases across the country to thrive and keep our national defense on the cutting edge amid limited federal resources.”  Translate: the government doesn’t have cash, so by partnering with MIT we can keep jobs and keep the base economically viable.

Research university as economic development agency - the new normal.  Expect the trend of university-led mega-projects and urban growth to continue unabated.  However, with economic policy winds in their sails, research universities must, more than ever, closely align with their host communities to reinforce the symbiotic bonds that lead to mutual prosperity.   A gambit that overplays the hand could lead to needless community level scuffles that would ultimately only serve to retard much needed economic progress.