WEBVTT 00:00:06.000 --> 00:00:11.000 Speaker 1 Hello and welcome to this edition of Community and University, your one-stop shop and the latest on community and economic development. 00:00:11.000 --> 00:00:13.000 Speaker 1 I'm your host, Jeffrey Franklin. 00:00:13.000 --> 00:00:17.000 Speaker 1 I'm a research assistant for the MSU Center for Community and Economic Development. 00:00:17.000 --> 00:00:19.000 Speaker 1 And today I'm joined by my guest, Norman Christopher. 00:00:19.000 --> 00:00:20.000 Speaker 1 How are you today, Norman? 00:00:20.000 --> 00:00:21.000 Speaker 2 Good morning. 00:00:21.000 --> 00:00:23.000 Speaker 2 Thank you for allowing me to join you today. 00:00:23.000 --> 00:00:24.000 Speaker 1 Of course. 00:00:24.000 --> 00:00:36.000 Speaker 1 Norman is a private consultant, and he sits on a number of advisory boards related to community development and sustainability, and recently retired from his post as an executive director of sustainability practices at Grand Valley State University. 00:00:36.000 --> 00:00:39.000 Speaker 1 Norm, can you tell me a bit about what you do? 00:00:39.000 --> 00:00:40.000 Speaker 2 Sure. 00:00:40.000 --> 00:00:42.000 Speaker 2 Let me go back a little bit. 00:00:42.000 --> 00:00:50.000 Speaker 2 My Michigan journey started where I helped ran a family-owned business as president and CEO. 00:00:50.000 --> 00:00:59.000 Speaker 2 And then I turned the business back over to the family and was challenged by this area of what's the next set of best practices coming to West Michigan. 00:00:59.000 --> 00:01:08.000 Speaker 2 And so I spent some time looking at sustainability from a full triple bottom line effect of economic, social, environmental impact. 00:01:08.000 --> 00:01:18.000 Speaker 2 And I was introduced to Grand Valley, where I spent the last 15 years in the Office of Sustainability Practices. 00:01:18.000 --> 00:01:19.000 Speaker 2 And 00:01:19.000 --> 00:01:23.000 Speaker 2 Along the way, sustainability became one of the seven core values for the university. 00:01:23.000 --> 00:01:31.000 Speaker 2 So it just didn't become an activity, it became more of a culture, and that allowed me to have the opportunity to work with the city of Grand Rapids as well. 00:01:31.000 --> 00:01:42.000 Speaker 2 So I have this kind of like a blend of both a business and a private sector and a public sector perspective relating to sustainable development. 00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:46.000 Speaker 2 So in the process, I was 00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:59.000 Speaker 2 blessed with the opportunity of being on a number of boards and advisory committees, like sustainability manufacturing processes for the furniture industry, and then as well as in the community. 00:01:59.000 --> 00:02:03.000 Speaker 2 And what attracted me is this growing area of social enterprise. 00:02:03.000 --> 00:02:10.000 Speaker 2 So as I left Grand Valley, I also looked at how are we really going to solve some of these systemic issues. 00:02:10.000 --> 00:02:18.000 Speaker 2 So that's where my journey, and it's always been a journey, not a destination, is in this area of systemic social problems. 00:02:18.000 --> 00:02:29.000 Speaker 2 So that's where I am today, and I really try to engage myself with those organizations and enterprises where they feel I might be able to add some value. 00:02:29.000 --> 00:02:32.000 Speaker 2 And I'm pleased to be an Innovation Fellow because 00:02:32.000 --> 00:02:38.000 Speaker 2 Like you, I consider myself to be in the research mode right now, but there's a lot more to come here. 00:02:38.000 --> 00:02:47.000 Speaker 1 Norm is one of the MSU Center for Regional Economic Innovation's Innovation Fellows for 2019 because, in large part, of his accomplishments in the past. 00:02:47.000 --> 00:02:56.000 Speaker 1 He's working on a project, from my understanding, trying to develop a playbook of sorts for the public sector for best practices in sustainable development. 00:02:56.000 --> 00:03:00.000 Speaker 1 Can you talk a little bit about this playbook, what it entails? 00:03:00.000 --> 00:03:01.000 Speaker 2 Sure. 00:03:01.000 --> 00:03:04.000 Speaker 2 And it really, I should say, is probably an inventory. 00:03:04.000 --> 00:03:07.000 Speaker 2 This space is so large. 00:03:07.000 --> 00:03:13.000 Speaker 2 There were a number of surprises when I first started to go out and do some of the research. 00:03:13.000 --> 00:03:14.000 Speaker 2 It's very complex. 00:03:14.000 --> 00:03:23.000 Speaker 2 These social issues, like affordable housing, like access to health care, education, for many residents are all interconnected issues. 00:03:23.000 --> 00:03:25.000 Speaker 2 So you can't separate them one from another. 00:03:25.000 --> 00:03:26.000 Speaker 2 So 00:03:26.000 --> 00:03:30.000 Speaker 2 by its nature, they're connected and they're very systemic. 00:03:30.000 --> 00:03:37.000 Speaker 2 So depending upon who you would talk to as a community stakeholder, they would give you different opinions. 00:03:37.000 --> 00:03:43.000 Speaker 2 But I had to land on something that I felt was important, and I did with affordable housing. 00:03:43.000 --> 00:03:45.000 Speaker 2 That's a challenge for most communities. 00:03:45.000 --> 00:03:51.000 Speaker 2 So as this work is unfolded, every community 00:03:51.000 --> 00:03:53.000 Speaker 2 is faced with those issues. 00:03:53.000 --> 00:04:04.000 Speaker 2 So the question is, could you develop a playbook or inventory of practices that can be used to do scalable, affordable housing projects wherever you are in Michigan? 00:04:04.000 --> 00:04:17.000 Speaker 2 Because all communities now face them, whether you're in a rural community that's attracted a major manufacturer to come in, like where are you going to house some of your employees, or how are you going to fix some of our urban core areas? 00:04:17.000 --> 00:04:21.000 Speaker 2 So that's the space that I got into. 00:04:21.000 --> 00:04:21.000 Speaker 2 And so the first 00:04:21.000 --> 00:04:36.000 Speaker 2 The first question is, what are tools for economic development that most developers, including cities, community stakeholders, and I should say that the group is large because foundations participate as well as NGOs. 00:04:36.000 --> 00:04:39.000 Speaker 2 So they're getting the right mix of stakeholders. 00:04:39.000 --> 00:04:40.000 Speaker 2 That's very important. 00:04:40.000 --> 00:04:42.000 Speaker 2 And then #2 is what are they currently using? 00:04:42.000 --> 00:04:46.000 Speaker 2 So there are a number of economic development programs, primarily federally funded. 00:04:46.000 --> 00:04:48.000 Speaker 2 And 00:04:48.000 --> 00:04:56.000 Speaker 2 Those include debt as well as tax incentives, and they're fairly well known, so I first had to get an inventory of what those look like. 00:04:56.000 --> 00:05:00.000 Speaker 2 And then, now, there are an emerging set of tools. 00:05:00.000 --> 00:05:07.000 Speaker 2 Some of those tools are areas like opportunity zones, impact investing. 00:05:07.000 --> 00:05:18.000 Speaker 2 So the question is, if you took a good project that had the fundamental economic development tools, and then asked the question, could I make a good project better? 00:05:18.000 --> 00:05:27.000 Speaker 2 with the use of some of these newer tools, that is where the energy started to flow in the community because they're being used by other communities. 00:05:27.000 --> 00:05:30.000 Speaker 2 And so that's what kind of got me into the space. 00:05:30.000 --> 00:05:33.000 Speaker 2 It's like, okay, what's that inventory? 00:05:33.000 --> 00:05:42.000 Speaker 2 And that's kind of been the journey that I've been on to get my arms around that inventory first, just to create awareness 00:05:42.000 --> 00:05:45.000 Speaker 2 to those in the public sector that they're available to use. 00:05:45.000 --> 00:05:46.000 Speaker 1 Right. 00:05:46.000 --> 00:05:49.000 Speaker 1 You talked about how this is such a large and emergent field. 00:05:49.000 --> 00:05:51.000 Speaker 1 Has that become an obstacle for this? 00:05:51.000 --> 00:05:59.000 Speaker 1 Like how does one person or just, I don't know, two people or however many people that have been working with this project work on this alone? 00:05:59.000 --> 00:06:07.000 Speaker 2 Well, I probably have now reached out because I tried to get the stakeholder groups and they're probably at least 10 or 12 00:06:07.000 --> 00:06:14.000 Speaker 2 areas that are stakeholder groups and then go ask them a basic set of questions like, what are your obstacles? 00:06:14.000 --> 00:06:18.000 Speaker 2 Do you have enough resources to get the project done? 00:06:18.000 --> 00:06:22.000 Speaker 2 Are you hearing all the voices that you should have regarding the project? 00:06:22.000 --> 00:06:24.000 Speaker 2 And that's an interesting one too. 00:06:24.000 --> 00:06:31.000 Speaker 2 And then the question sort of becomes like, well, whose responsibility is it in the 1st place to solve these problems? 00:06:31.000 --> 00:06:37.000 Speaker 2 So those are obstacles from the beginning. 00:06:37.000 --> 00:06:42.000 Speaker 2 But there's a pathway that's leading to success through them now, another. 00:06:42.000 --> 00:06:46.000 Speaker 2 difficulty is terminology. 00:06:46.000 --> 00:06:55.000 Speaker 2 So when you use things like impact investing, which is used, that might mean environmental impact, it could mean social impact. 00:06:55.000 --> 00:07:03.000 Speaker 2 So you actually have to unpackage some of the terms to put them in a layman or marketplace so that they're well understood. 00:07:03.000 --> 00:07:05.000 Speaker 2 So part of the work 00:07:05.000 --> 00:07:10.000 Speaker 2 Jeff has to be an understanding fundamentally of what these terms mean. 00:07:10.000 --> 00:07:17.000 Speaker 2 So that was a little bit more of a challenge and an obstacle that I saw. 00:07:17.000 --> 00:07:30.000 Speaker 2 The other piece that's in there in the challenge becomes once you do the inventory, there's another piece that's going to be how do you actually make them work? 00:07:30.000 --> 00:07:38.000 Speaker 2 And so my first challenge and obstacle was how could you create just an awareness in this space about the tools today? 00:07:38.000 --> 00:07:44.000 Speaker 2 And so that's what this first work in the research will entail. 00:07:44.000 --> 00:07:51.000 Speaker 1 Do you want to tell me a little bit about like what your presentation at the summit is kind of geared towards like briefly? 00:07:51.000 --> 00:07:56.000 Speaker 2 Well, you know, it's community members can actually help with this. 00:07:56.000 --> 00:07:59.000 Speaker 2 So I am available. 00:07:59.000 --> 00:08:00.000 Speaker 2 And 00:08:00.000 --> 00:08:03.000 Speaker 2 I can certainly have some emails that are out there. 00:08:03.000 --> 00:08:19.000 Speaker 2 I'm also on LinkedIn, but I'd really like to know for those that are in the communities today, whether it's from large cities, small cities, or rural, what are those pressing issues regarding social impact that you're facing? 00:08:19.000 --> 00:08:22.000 Speaker 2 In some areas, it might be healthcare, more importantly than anything, or access. 00:08:22.000 --> 00:08:30.000 Speaker 2 So part of that is an opportunity to ask the question, which of these areas are most important? 00:08:30.000 --> 00:08:33.000 Speaker 2 Secondly is, do you have enough resources to get the project work done? 00:08:33.000 --> 00:08:36.000 Speaker 2 In other words, financing tools. 00:08:36.000 --> 00:08:48.000 Speaker 2 And so that's, and then another question that's related to that, I think is important is, does your community miss the access to some basic services that it needs? 00:08:48.000 --> 00:08:54.000 Speaker 2 So those are ways that anybody in the community can feel that they can participate. 00:08:54.000 --> 00:08:55.000 Speaker 2 in this project. 00:08:55.000 --> 00:09:05.000 Speaker 2 So given that, what I've tried to do in this presentation at the upcoming summit is to try to drill down on, first of all, where is the problem? 00:09:05.000 --> 00:09:10.000 Speaker 2 And I have to tell you that the problem is a bit greater than I expected. 00:09:10.000 --> 00:09:15.000 Speaker 2 One thing that's out there that everyone in Michigan can reference is ALICE. 00:09:15.000 --> 00:09:20.000 Speaker 2 And ALICE stands for Asset Limited Income Constrained Employed. 00:09:20.000 --> 00:09:29.000 Speaker 2 And so that can describe qualitatively and quantitatively how these issues fit into different counties just in Michigan. 00:09:29.000 --> 00:09:38.000 Speaker 2 So I go drill down a little deeper just for Grand Rapids, besides having that framework, can I get down into some specific neighborhood responses? 00:09:38.000 --> 00:09:40.000 Speaker 2 And I've been able to do that. 00:09:40.000 --> 00:09:41.000 Speaker 2 But that's a first piece. 00:09:41.000 --> 00:09:46.000 Speaker 2 And then the question that will flow from that is, 00:09:46.000 --> 00:09:48.000 Speaker 2 Where are the resources today? 00:09:48.000 --> 00:09:57.000 Speaker 2 And I mentioned some of the economic development tools, but I think another important discussion, which we'll get into, what are the available sources of capital? 00:09:57.000 --> 00:10:05.000 Speaker 2 And I think we don't spend enough time looking at those, but they're probably 12 or 13 that you can look at besides financial capital that everybody goes to first. 00:10:05.000 --> 00:10:14.000 Speaker 2 So I always go to the area that I understand we all need financial capital, but what else is out there to use in conjunction with? 00:10:14.000 --> 00:10:20.000 Speaker 2 And then we'll get talking about impact investing, and then we'll talk a little bit more about where are the opportunities. 00:10:20.000 --> 00:10:31.000 Speaker 2 And we'll do some examples of some of these affordable housing projects that really I would call mixed-use, multi-income type projects. 00:10:31.000 --> 00:10:35.000 Speaker 2 They're a bit more complex, but they can actually provide greater economic impact. 00:10:35.000 --> 00:10:42.000 Speaker 2 And it will kind of like wind up with some key success factors that people have mentioned to me when you do these kinds of projects. 00:10:42.000 --> 00:10:44.000 Speaker 2 So it's 00:10:44.000 --> 00:10:47.000 Speaker 2 very pragmatic. 00:10:47.000 --> 00:10:54.000 Speaker 2 This is kind of like where I came from writing the first book I did on sustainability best practices for businesses. 00:10:54.000 --> 00:11:02.000 Speaker 2 This one sort of fits my pragmatic mode of tell me really what works. 00:11:02.000 --> 00:11:08.000 Speaker 2 And so that's been where I've tried to focus this presentation, just to create awareness of what worked. 00:11:08.000 --> 00:11:13.000 Speaker 1 You mentioned how community members can get involved in a practical way. 00:11:13.000 --> 00:11:14.000 Speaker 1 How should they do that? 00:11:14.000 --> 00:11:15.000 Speaker 1 Should they reach out to you? 00:11:15.000 --> 00:11:16.000 Speaker 1 Sure. 00:11:16.000 --> 00:11:19.000 Speaker 2 Yeah, and come here and you can forward the along. 00:11:19.000 --> 00:11:25.000 Speaker 2 But the reason why I really think that input's important 00:11:25.000 --> 00:11:37.000 Speaker 2 You could look at the city of Grand Rapids and say, fine, I'm part of that, but then you drill down to Kent County and that's 650,000 kind of people, or you can get into a neighborhood or a rural community. 00:11:37.000 --> 00:11:39.000 Speaker 2 All of those have these issues. 00:11:39.000 --> 00:11:40.000 Speaker 1 Yeah. 00:11:40.000 --> 00:11:43.000 Speaker 2 I haven't had the time to go out to do all that work. 00:11:43.000 --> 00:11:43.000 Speaker 1 Exactly. 00:11:43.000 --> 00:11:48.000 Speaker 2 So my question is, if those are pressing issues, I'd like to know about them. 00:11:48.000 --> 00:11:48.000 Speaker 2 Absolutely. 00:11:48.000 --> 00:11:55.000 Speaker 2 And maybe afford you some things to look at and consider for doing this most important work moving forward. 00:11:55.000 --> 00:11:57.000 Speaker 2 So I think there's some gift back here too. 00:11:57.000 --> 00:11:59.000 Speaker 1 So how would they go about reaching out to you? 00:11:59.000 --> 00:12:00.000 Speaker 1 How can they best reach you? 00:12:00.000 --> 00:12:04.000 Speaker 2 Well, I guess you could look at LinkedIn. 00:12:04.000 --> 00:12:08.000 Speaker 2 My profile's up there, but you could use my... 00:12:08.000 --> 00:12:15.000 Speaker 2 My current e-mail, one in Grand Valley that you can use is chrisfn@gvsu.edu. 00:12:15.000 --> 00:12:19.000 Speaker 2 Even though I'm retired, I still will have that e-mail. 00:12:19.000 --> 00:12:19.000 Speaker 2 Sure. 00:12:19.000 --> 00:12:21.000 Speaker 2 And I still do a number of work. 00:12:21.000 --> 00:12:24.000 Speaker 2 So it's not too hard to get in contact with me, or you could drop something off here. 00:12:24.000 --> 00:12:26.000 Speaker 2 But I really would like to know your input. 00:12:26.000 --> 00:12:29.000 Speaker 1 I think those are all the questions we have for you today. 00:12:29.000 --> 00:12:33.000 Speaker 1 I want to extend the Michigan State University Center for Regional Economic Innovations. 00:12:33.000 --> 00:12:37.000 Speaker 1 Thanks to Norman Christopher, you have been an absolute pleasure to have. 00:12:37.000 --> 00:12:48.000 Speaker 1 If you'd like to hear more about Norman Christopher's project, you can read about it on the MSU REI website, reicenter.org, under current projects. 00:12:48.000 --> 00:12:53.000 Speaker 1 He will also be presenting at our summit, our Innovate Michigan Summit, on August 29th. 00:12:53.000 --> 00:12:57.000 Speaker 1 You can register to attend the summit also on reicenter.org. 00:12:57.000 --> 00:12:59.000 Speaker 1 That is Thursday, August 29th. 00:12:59.000 --> 00:13:01.000 Speaker 1 There will be a reception after all the presentations. 00:13:01.000 --> 00:13:04.000 Speaker 1 There will be a breakfast and a boxed lunch. 00:13:04.000 --> 00:13:08.000 Speaker 1 So it is a great deal and we would love to have you. 00:13:08.000 --> 00:13:09.000 Speaker 1 there. 00:13:09.000 --> 00:13:10.000 Speaker 1 Thank you again, Norman. 00:13:10.000 --> 00:13:11.000 Speaker 1 It was an absolute pleasure. 00:13:11.000 --> 00:13:13.000 Speaker 2 Enjoyed being with you this morning. 00:13:13.000 --> 00:13:18.000 Speaker 2 Thanks, Jim.