Recently ICMA, Arizona State University, and the Alliance for Innovation conducted a 2016 innovations survey to explore innovation and organizational change in U.S. local governments. Among respondents who described the kinds of changes they are making, changes to the local government’s role in economic development and the organizational alignment of this function were commonly cited.

With more than thirty years of conducting survey research in the area of economic development in local government, ICMA has gathered data about such things as how local governments fund economic development, what barriers they encounter, and what motivates economic development.

First-hand stories bring the research to life, so we talked with three of the innovation survey respondents about their significant organizational changes related to economic development. They generously shared not only their specific examples of change and innovation but also their observations, lessons learned, and insights.