Columbus Ohio is one of seven finalists in the 2013 Intelligent Community of the Year, as chosen by the Intelligent Community Forum. Whoa, isn’t Columbus a bombed out, rust belt disaster? Apparently not. A lot of smart people, organizations, and companies have joined together to make Columbus a thriving, nice place to live, and in the process are showing other cities how to do it too.
The perception of Columbus, Ohio, and the new reality are very different. “The perception is Ohio is in the industrial rust belt, largely irrelevant, not really doing much, living on old foundry fumes. That’s not at all the case,” he said. “It is a very hip city, and their incubator, TechColumbus, is literally putting out all kinds of new businesses.” In addition, said Zacharilla, the city has effectively reversed “brain drain,” so highly trained and intelligent people stay in the area versus move elsewhere.