Attendees tour downtown before annual meeting

By Ruth Melville

The Northwest Hills Council of Governments (NHCOG) held its 2019 Economic Development Summit in Norfolk on Feb. 19. This annual gathering gives representatives of the 21 towns in the Northwest Corner a chance to assess how their region is doing—what gains, or losses, were experienced during the previous year—and set the agenda for the future. The summit is planned and run by Jocelyn Ayer, NHCOG’s director of community and economic development.

After an open house at the Norfolk Hub, attendees gathered in Infinity Hall, where they were welcomed by Ayer; the state representative for the 64th District, Maria Horn; and Norfolk’s first selectman, Matt Riiska.

The major theme of the presentations that followed was the vital importance of bringing high-speed fiber optic Internet service to the Northwest Corner.

The keynote speaker was Matt Dunn, founder and director of the Vermont-based Center on Rural Innovation. Dunn reported that since the recession of 2008, we now have the largest ever opportunity gap between urban and rural areas. The forecast for rural work is grim, thanks in part to the automation of farming, inadequate infrastructure and a lack of density of talent. The solution, he says, is to provide broadband to everyone. And not just in one town. He called for a regional network to create a digital economy ecosystem that could “bring 21st-century prosperity to rural America.”

Like Dunn, the next speaker, Norfolk resident and president of Northwest Connect Kim Maxwell, is convinced that fiber optic broadband is essential. He drew an analogy between broadband and roads, saying that broadband networks are as important as roads, water and electricity. The state should provide for broadband, he says, as it does other essential infrastructure, but that will take time—and we in rural Connecticut will be the last to get it. His conclusion: “We have to do it ourselves.”

NHCOG’s Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy (CEDS), adopted last year, picked out five areas of concentration: fiber optics for one, but also innovation and entrepreneurship; farming; arts, culture and tourism; and manufacturing and workforce development. Representatives of organizations in each of these areas were offered five minutes to present an update on their year’s progress. 

The manager of the Regional Food Hub, Renée Giroux, reported that after a year and a half in operation, the hub is now connecting 22 local farms with 30 retail and wholesale buyers. She urged people to spread the word about the hub by recommending it to stores and restaurants in their towns.

Evan Dobos, of CivicLift, talked about the launch of a new website, DiscoverLitchfieldHills.com, with tabs connecting to an “Eat Local” page, a “Take a Hike” page and a “Jobs Hub” page. Dobos encouraged each town to develop a sister website that would connect to the LitchfieldHills site to provide a single resource for the entire region.

Michael Rooke, the president of Northwest Connecticut Community College, stressed the college’s collaboration with local high schools to attract young people into STEM careers.

Perhaps the most ambitious project underway is that of Five Points Gallery in Torrington and its executive director, Judith McElhone. Five Points is raising money to purchase the former University of Connecticut Torrington campus, which it plans to turn into a cutting-edge national center for artists, including an auditorium, classes and studio spaces.

The evening finished with a Q & A with Dunne, Maxwell and Ben Paletsky, a tech entrepreneur and CEO of South Farms in Morris, Conn. Dunne and Maxwell repeated their conviction that fiber optic is the only possibility for the future, with Maxwell saying that “there’s money out there” to help pay for it. In response to a question about what schools should be doing, Dunne suggested that students in grades K-12 should learn computer coding. As the evening came to a close, Maxwell, to the delight of some in the audience, reminded his listeners that we should also teach students how to write, a crucial skill for the communication of ideas. “If you can’t write, you can’t think,” he said.