Dublin is Repeat Winner As A Smart21 Community

(Dublin, Ohio) – For the second year in a row, the City of Dublin has been named a Smart21 Community by the Intelligent Community Forum. Dublin shares the honor with Stockholm, Sweden; Malta; Porto Alegre, Brazil; Talinn, Estonia; Westchester County, N.Y.; and 15 other cities around the globe.

The Intelligent Community Forum announced the finalists today in South Korea during the e-Government Gangnam Conference, hosted by ICF’s 2008 Intelligent Community of the Year, the Gangnam District of Seoul.

“We strive to give our residents and businesses the most innovative services to keep Dublin globally competitive,” said Deputy City Manager/Director of Economic Development Dana McDaniel. “It is an incredible honor to be recognized by the Intelligent Community Forum, and to be included in the same company as these leading communities from around the world.”

The Smart21 announcement is the first stage of ICF's annual Intelligent Community of the Year awards cycle. It will be followed by the naming of the Top Seven Intelligent Communities of the Year, selected from among the Smart21, on Jan. 21, 2009 during the Pacific Telecommunications Council annual conference in Honolulu, Hawaii. The cycle concludes in New York City on May 15, 2009 during ICF’s annual Building the Broadband Economy Summit, where one of the Top Seven will succeed Gangnam as Intelligent Community of the Year.

The awards program also is an ongoing research project. Each community submitted detailed nomination forms to ICF, which analyzed the information to identify and document best practices in broadband deployment, knowledge workforce development, digital inclusion, innovation and marketing and advocacy. The information is shared with communities around the world, in order to help them benchmark themselves against their global competition and better meet the challenges of the Broadband Economy.

The Smart21 of 2009
The Smart21 of 2009 includes communities from 12 nations on four continents with populations ranging from 17,000 to 2.5 million.

* Albany, New York, USA; population 94,000
* Ashland, Oregon, USA; population 22,000
* Bristol, Virginia, USA; population 17,500
* Dublin, Ohio, USA; population 40,000
* Edmonton, Alberta, Canada; population 1,035,000
* Eindhoven, Netherlands; population 297,000
* Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada; population 50,535
* Gold Coast City, Queensland, Australia; population 509,000
* Issy-les-Moulineaux, France; population 61,000
* Kenora, Ontario, Canada; population 17,000
* Malta; population 405,000
* Manchester, England, UK; population 2,500,000
* Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada; population 125,000
* Nelson Mandela Bay, South Africa; population 1,200,000
* Porto Alegre, Brazil; population 1,400,000
* Riverside, California, USA; population 291,000
* Stockholm, Sweden; population 795,000
* Tallinn, Estonia; population 400,000
* Taoyuan County, Taiwan; population 1,950,000
* Trikala, Greece; population 52,000
* Westchester County, New York, USA; population 950,000

Eight of the communities were on the 2008 Smart21 list and three were named to the 2008 Top Seven. Ten of the 2009 Smart21 are North American communities, seven are from Europe, two from Asia-Pacific, one from South America, and one from Africa. In addition to individual cities and towns, the 2009 Smart21 includes two counties and two multi-city metropolitan areas.

"Each of these communities has demonstrated a commitment to improving their communities through innovative broadband applications," said Louis Zacharilla, ICF Co-founder. "The ingenuity of these communities is exemplified in their investments in the future of the young, the growth and progress of job-creating businesses and economic security. An overarching theme of the 2009 honorees has been the dedication to putting people first and building a 'talent inventory' that will thrive with technology and innovation."

More information on each community is available at ICF's Web site (www.intelligentcommunity.org/smart21). The Smart21 were selected from hundreds of candidates and submissions from communities large and small with submissions received from every continent.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Oct. 29, 2008
Contact: Nancy Richison
Economic Development
614-410-4643