I’m pleased to report that the board of directors of Dakota Future is celebrating a very successful launch of its Intelligent Community Initiative last Thursday and Friday. More than 40 community leaders attended the networking reception on Thursday at Unisys and 75 leaders at the workshop on Friday, we were able to begin the important job of spreading the word and gaining support for our Initiative.

We were excited to learn from our benchmarking that Dakota County exceeded the average scores of the past four year’s Intelligent Community finalists in 3 of the 5 benchmark categories – in broadband, in knowledge workers and in digital inclusion. We have some work to do in innovation and marketing/advocacy.

We have formed teams in the five benchmark areas, plus a leadership team with next meetings scheduled for early November. It is an exciting time for Dakota Future and I’m pleased to be helping them through the process.