www.iowagreatplaces.gov

The Iowa Department of Cultural Affairs cordially invites you to attend!

All events held at the State Historical Building unless noted otherwise.

7:30 a.m. – Breakfast with Legislators (North Wing of Capitol Rotunda)
10:00 a.m. – Great Places Session for Exploratory Track. Classroom A, third floor
10:00 a.m. – Great Places Session for Pre-Application Track. Classroom B, third floor
12:00 p.m. – Meet the Great Places Citizen Advisory Board *Classrooms A & B
1:30 p.m. – Great Places Session for Designee Track. Classroom A
4:00 p.m. – Signing of Memorandums of Understanding for 2010 Designees

* There will be a nominal fee for the luncheon.

The sessions for the Exploratory and Pre-Application tracks will provide an overview of the process along with a discussion of what is great. The designee track session will address how to manage a Great Places project. All three sessions will feature representatives from designated Great Places.

Governor Terry Branstad will sign the Memorandums of Understanding, and Department of Cultural Affairs Director Mary Cownie will address the group.

Please contact Francis Boggus at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
or Linda Howard at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it with any questions.

Analysis of the Economic and Place Impacts of the Iowa Great Places Program

This three part report opens with The Executive Summary that gives a brief analysis of the economic study on the first nine Great Places, from 2006 to the present, and the very positive results. Most of the communities in the study are performing at or above their peer Midwestern communities in the categories analyzed.

The Report examines 12 categories: population, school enrollment, employment, retail pull, potential sales, sales capacity, per capita sales, retail firms, hotel tax revenue, specialty retail sales, tourism dollars and tourism employment. The Executive Summary rates each place in each of the 12 categories. The full report is 74 pages long and provides details and statistics.

The study was performed by Meghan O’Brien of O’Brien Economic Consulting. We are very proud of what Great Places has accomplished!

Download Presentation

This presentation is an overview of the 2010 Great Places Economic Impact Report prepared by Meghan O’Brien and demonstrates that implementing a shared and developed vision for a community is enhanced by making arts, history and culture part of the economic component of a community. Economic improvement of the entire community happens when the substantial assets of a community are leveraged with all segments of a place, thus creating more jobs and a healthier economic climate for the whole community.