Regional Intelligence - Regional Communities Greetings: Today every company, organization and community needs a regional strategy. It may include adjoining jurisdictions, your state or states, county, continent or world. From the centerpoints of your home, business or community, there are existing regional alignments to match the scope and scale of your operations. Businesses use these alignments as markets. Markets can become communities. Regional intelligence makes regions visible for the use of leaders and problem-solvers.   Regional Intelligence? Regional intelligence is the conceptual tool to first experience this, then the method by which to determine strategies, tactics, partnerships and alliances. Instead of having to create regions from your perception of the world, existing regional alignments can serve as building blocks. Building regional community is the operational strategy.  What is a region? At its simplest, in a political sense, a region exists where two governments have a formal agreement to cooperate across a common political boundary. Any boundary of consequence then establishes a need for some cooperation. What is a boundary of consequence? When you cross the boundary line, some rules change. Costs, revenues and responsibility changes. How many multi-jurisdictional regions can there be? Hundreds of thousands when you consider the permutations of neighboring local jurisdictions - towns, cities, counties within states and adjoining states and nations. By virtue of national and state laws, this is less of a problem than one would imagine - because nations and states are organized regions. There are many systems of defined multi-jurisdictional regions. The advantage to organizations, be they for-profit, non-profit, or public, is a standard regional sub-state geography and data. Virginia is a leading state in this regard, having required State agencies to use the 1968 Planning District geography as the basis for their own regions.  Virginia Planning Districts - Emerging Regional Communities Intelligence is the Purpose of Regions! From the top-down, organizations use regions to manage. From the bottom-up (where you may sit) citizens of defined regions can use them as regional communties to gain empowerment. Why is it hard for local governments to cooperate regionally? Local governments were created, perhaps a hundred or more years ago, with an inward focus. To that effective design local governments are beginning to learn how to cooperate regionally - as housing and labor markets are regional, and economic competition is global. This emerging trend I call "regional community." It is made visible in a weekly free e-mail newsletter Regional Community Development News. Businesses see markets, and with freedom of travel, citizens are not confined to a single locality for work, housing, shopping or recreation. Opportunities exist for alignment of public and corporate regional geographies. Alignment creates value, enables creativity and supports sustainability. To see how this approach has emerged, subscribe to Regional Community Development News and ask for some of the free PowerPoints below. I'm available for speaking engagements, brain-stretching strategic planning sessions, or one-on-one to provide this perspective for you. To learn more or add your thoughts - send me an email: "Tom.Christoffel (at) gmail.com" Sincerely Tom Tom Christoffel, AICP, Editor Regional Community Development News Regional Intelligence - Regional Communities, LLC Box 1444 * Front Royal, Virginia (VA) 22630 "Acknowledge boundaries. Work across them. Think local planet, act regionally." Copyright 2003-2007 - Tom (Thomas J.) Christoffel Do your regional community re:search, tag re:, for region, regions, regional - using the "Google Custom Search" box below. All sites have some relations to regions, so search by topic only - e.g. air quality, transportation, water, etc. Free reports: 1. Mid-Atlantic Super-Region Mapping the Regional Council as an Analytic Unit - I see regions. - Mid-Atlantic Regional Planning Roundtable III, Baltimore Metropolitan Council, December 8, 2006, Baltimore, Maryland. 2. The Sub-State District/Regional Council as a Geospatial Unit of Analytical Geography for the United States - Shenandoah Valley/Mid-Atlantic Pilot Project, Virginia Tech, April 7, 2006, Blacksburg, Virginia. 3. The U.S. Mid-Atlantic Region How is it mapped and used? - I see regions. Mid-Atlantic Regional Planning Roundtable II, February 17, 2006, Washington, D.C. 4. Regional Community in the Northern Shenandoah Valley - March 9, 2004 - A presentation for the Senior Roundtable, Winchester, Virginia. 5. Community Security and Regional Cooperation - Presented July 19, 2003 at the World Future Society's - World Future 2003 – 21st Century Opportunities and Challenges - San Francisco, California. 6. Panel – A Question of Integrity: Tomorrow’s Leadership Integrity to what? A Boundary Check! 'Think Local Planet, Act Regionally. Presented July 20, 2003 at the World Future Society - World Future 2003 – 21st Century Opportunities and Challenges - San Francisco, California. 7. Regional Community DNA for Effective Regionalism - Presented July 21, 2002 at the World Future Society's 22nd General Conference - WorldView 2002: Futures Unlimited!" Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 8. Regions Work! What's a region? Presented July 20, 1998 at the World Future Society's Conference - FutureQuest: Strategies of the New Millennium Chicago, Illinois. This was the launch of the Regions Work Initiative.