Speaking with the Smart Cities Caucus in Washington

Washington D.C. — Tuesday, March 20th, Tom Schryver, Executive Director of Cornell’s Center for Regional Economic Advancement participated in the launch of the Smart Cities Caucus, chaired by Rep. Yvette Clarke, D-NY and co-chair, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-CA.

This spring lawmakers will host a series of roundtables on Capitol Hill on issues facing smart cities: connectivity, mobility, workforce, and sustainability. As one of the few university representatives, Schryver joined business leaders and elected officials, to discuss policy recommendations and possible legislation for Congress to consider to improve connectivity.

Schryver spoke at one of the Caucus events: “Bandwidth [for internet connectivity] is important but it isn’t the only important thing. If we want to have a smart city, we need to keep our smarts in the city, which means making our cities a great place to live and work. In Ithaca, many of our global experts need broadband and tech to do their daily work – it is part of maintaining competitiveness.”

In more rural areas with more constituencies, Schryver also recommended federal support to incentivize cities to cooperate in order to achieve critical mass for essential broadband services.