Austin Mayoral Election: Ask the candidates...

Brewster McCracken on Tech Economy

If elected, what would be your plans for creating, fostering, and retaining high-tech companies and jobs in Austin? What concrete steps can we expect in your first three months in office?

For a generation, the semiconductor industry has been the foundation of our economy. And now, these jobs are moving overseas.

How Austin responds to this challenge is the central issue in this mayoral election.

Will we move forward? Or will we be content to stand still and watch others pass us by?

The focus of my campaign’s economic strategy – and the core challenging facing Austin’s economy – is protecting jobs and pursuing opportunities in the emerging job sectors of the 21st Century Economy: clean energy, biotech and creative media.

I have laid out on my campaign blog the specific steps that I will pursue to protect jobs and create new clean energy, biotech and creative economy jobs.

Just this week, the New York Times reported that Oregon is successfully repurposing semiconductor fabs for solar manufacturing, and that this approach is creating new opportunities for people who have worked in the semiconductor industry. This story demonstrates the value of moving now into these new economic sectors.

Attempting simply to ride out the current storm will not address this fundamental challenge to our economic future. In fact, a hunker down approach would cost us valuable time while other regions work to establish leadership in the emerging job sectors of the 21st Century Economy.

I believe Austin leaders – including the mayor – need to begin work NOW on new opportunities in clean energy (particularly solar, energy storage and smart grid software systems), biotech (including nanomedicine, microfluidics and medical devices) and creative media (film, digital media, wireless, music and video games).

How we respond to this global economic challenge will determine our region’s economic future.

Austin invests in programs to promote local film and music. Do you believe similar investment is necessary in our local high-tech industry? Why or why not? If yes, what type of investment would you consider? Historically speaking, what specifically have you done to promote Austin’s high-tech industry?

I do. That is why I have worked with entrepreneurs, university researchers and community leaders on critical efforts for our region’s economic future, including forming a regional partnership with San Antonio to create solar manufacturing jobs, creating the Pecan Street Project clean energy consortium and developing strategies to repurpose our semiconductor industry facilities and employees.

I made Austin Energy the first utility in the nation to open its grid for clean energy companies to test their technologies, I initiated the creation of the bioscience and wireless incubators in partnership with U.T., and I have made out of state job recruitment trips and given a speech before economic leaders in Silicon Valley to promote investment in Austin.

Social media has emerged thanks to an attitude shift in the online public at large: people want to communicate with each other, and openly engage with their government. How do you think Austin city government can embrace social media to better engage its citizens with ideas, policy, and decision-making?

My campaign has partnered with local social media entrepreneurs on the website Ideas for Austin. This site serves as a forum for Austinites to promote and share ideas for Austin’s future.

Through my own campaign, I have also used social media tools including Facebook, Twitter and my online blog The Crow’s Nest.

The city can more actively promote social media tools such as Twitter for communicating information (the CDC’s recent use of Twitter for swine flu updates is a good example), and elected officials can build on the Ideas for Austin site to create a true marketplace of ideas for the community.