[1st-mile-nm] Lujan: Libraries + Innovation

[Richard Lowenberg]

Lujan: Libraries + Innovation

http://www.nextgov.com/cio-briefing/2017/01/lawmaker-public-libraries-can-boost-american-innovation/134518/

President-elect Donald Trump's technology agenda is largely opaque, but 
at least one member of Congress has a message for his administration: 
ideas for cutting-edge technology often comes from the grassroots.

“Innovation may have a national or even global impact but like politics, 
the process of innovation is inherently local,” Rep. Ben Ray Lujan, 
D-N.M., said during an Information Technology and Innovation Foundation 
event on Capitol Hill on Wednesday. The government needs to think of 
creative ways to “provide resources to the innovators ... across the 
country," he added.

Lujan advocated for establishing maker-spaces in public libraries, 
potentially outfitting them with small-scale manufacturing equipment 
such as 3-D printers, that are accessible to businesses, researchers and 
the nearby community. Because public libraries already exist across 
America, "including the rural parts, where we still don’t have bandwidth 
capacity," they could become hubs for technological development outside 
Silicon Valley, he said.

Lujan, who co-founded the House Technology Transfer Caucus, singled out 
this and a few other innovation-themed recommendations for Trump's 
administration mentioned in a report from the ITIF and the Brookings 
Institution.

He also advocated for creating an Energy Department-based nonprofit that 
could dole out funds to transition technology out of federal research 
labs and into the marketplace. Lujan said he's working on legislation 
that would encourage Energy to promote partnerships with local economic 
development groups including maker-spaces.

Other specific recommendations mentioned in the report include 
encouraging student entrepreneurship and increasing research and 
development tax credit generosity.


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Richard Lowenberg, Executive Director
1st-Mile Institute     505-603-5200
Box 8001, Santa Fe, NM 87504,
rl at 1st-mile.org     www.1st-mile.org
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