Local Government Thinking like a Startup

Flywheel is so important because if you have that mindset of understanding and bringing in that innovative mindset and the talent that you recruit in your ecosystem and then pull in these business challenges or government challenges, you can solve so many problems and and create better economy, create better outcomes for just the people that live here, people in our region, people in our state or across the country. And that's why what you do is so critical to being able to solve some of these problems and just think of it in a completely different way. And so I love the the bright minds, the new ideas that come in, from the work that Flywheel does.

Flywheel Social Enterprise Hub is a community of social driven entrepreneurs, experienced and talented coaches, angel investors, philanthropreneurs, and subject matter experts. These folks share resources, energies, and ideas to help social entrepreneurs build and scale businesses that have both a financial return and a social impact. The Double Bottom Line My name is Joan Kaupp. I am the host of On the Fly! Today, we have a special member of our community at our microphone.

Liz Keating is currently the vice president of government affairs and advocacy with the Cincinnati, USA Regional Chamber of Commerce. She first became engaged with Flywheel while she served as one of Cincinnati's city council members, where she was focused on housing, its zoning, limitations, and restrictions. With her support, Flywheel Social Enterprise Hub facilitated a housing hackathon to generate and identify innovative thinking about how to address the shortage of affordable housing in our city. Here to talk about all of that and more is Flywheel executive director Donna Zaring and Ms. Liz Keating.

Hi, Liz.

Hi.

You know, I think it's been three years since we first met. It's kind of hard to believe time really flies. But we met when you were a relatively new city council member, and I was working at Centrifuge. One of my first projects was working with you as a council member on an innovation hackathon

Mhmm.

To reduce litter in our neighborhoods. That was a really great project for which Flywheel was a key partner and was just one of the many initiatives that you spearheaded as a council member to create more innovation in government. Talk a little bit about that. Tell us a little bit about, why did you wanna change the mindset of government during your time as a council member?

I just think there's so much opportunity to drive innovation within government. Like, there are so many different challenges. And if you get government to start thinking in the way of innovative businesses and partner with startup ecosystem in the Cincinnati region, we can drive that innovation and actually save a lot of taxpayer dollars that can then be spent in so many other cool visionary projects. And so I wanted to try to create that kind of atmosphere and that mindset to be able to just have that better partnership. You've got government.

You've got the startup ecosystem. You've got the business community. And how do you start utilizing all of the different talents and expertise throughout the region to be able to drive that innovation in government. And so when we got the other council members to agree to fund something like this, because it was so different and something that was totally outside of normal government, We got it to fund it, and then we looked at what's the first project that we can do that is interesting to community members. And litter is a huge problem in Cincinnati.

And we have so many different groups in Cincinnati that work to clean up neighborhoods, to combat litter. And then the city spends millions every single year, and it doesn't really move the needle. So let's use this because it impacts everybody. We can get more people engaged with what's going on at the city, but then also bring in these innovative minds in the startup ecosystem. And then the business minds within the business community come together along with the people who work in government who are deep experts in this area, but they're not given the space to be able to think outside the box and drive new innovation and create new solutions.

Mhmm. Yeah, I I remember how exciting it was when we got the different groups within city government together really for the first time to talk about the litter challenge all in the same room. We've said the word hackathon a few times and you and I know what that is, but some of our audience may not know what a hackathon is. How would you describe a hackathon?

I would say so I think it's several pieces. And you bring all these groups together, and then you have a facilitator who helps first break down what the problem is and then create that problem statement of what you're trying to solve for. And then you put out that problem statement out to the community. And you can have community members. You can have startups.

You can just have entrepreneurs. You can have students that come in to basically hack at that problem statement and come up with new solutions. And so that first one with Litter, I think we did it a week long. We did office hours with different experts from the city. We did office hours with innovators, with successful startups and entrepreneurs to ask questions, to gather data.

We shared data between different groups, like Keep Cincinnati Beautiful that understands litter cleanup throughout the city. And they have access to data with Keep America Beautiful nationwide. We had the city departments, our Office of Environment Sustainability. We had public services that does a lot of the bulk pickup and litter pickup. Pulling all that together.

And then during those office hours, innovators, those teams can ask questions, make sure they're on the right path for the solving of the problem. And then we have pitch day. And that's what you ran. Well, you ran the whole thing. But then, really, the coolest part is you bring everybody together.

That was at Union Hall. And we had so many teams compete. And they pitch their idea. And then you have a panel of judges that ask questions. And then at the end of the day, have the champion.

And then you take that idea and you try to start implementing it within government. And it was cool because we had, I think, junior high students all the way up to octogenarians that wanted to get together and just find something new to learn about and try to pitch new ideas of how to clean up their neighborhood.

We did. I think the winner was the freshman in high school, maybe?

Yeah. We had teenage girls who got together, who they're part of a group that does a lot of innovative work. And then we also had I think they were second place. And then the winner was a partnership of city employees, neighborhood leaders, and just community members who were genuinely interested and had their own ideas because they live the experience of having litter on their doorstep and on their streets and in their yards every single day. And they wanted to pitch new ideas of how to clean it up.

And one participant, Lucas Williamson, created he's a startup. He has a company called Product Refinery, and they do all kinds of manufacturing for startup companies. They created the cleanup cart.

Mhmm.

And his prototype actually, didn't that go on to receive some, funding from Main Street Ventures?

He did. He got funded from his idea that came out of the hack, which made neighborhood cleanups far more efficient with his product with the cleanup cart. Yeah. So it's incredible the different things that and business opportunities that are created out of these hacks in addition to helping government and then offset the cost of government to be able to clean these things up and then that ripple effect in the community. When you're getting rid of litter, you're creating more neighborhood pride.

You're creating healthier atmosphere for kids to grow up in. There's a huge difference between kids that grow up and everything is green and they have trees and it's nice and it's fun to be outside. And kids who walk outside every single morning and right at their doorstep, people are just dumping. And the disrespect for them and their neighborhood and where they live versus being able to create a much better environment for them creates far better outcomes for those kids long term.

Yeah, I thought that was really eye opening when we were working on this project together. Not only can a hackathon, create new opportunities for startups, to to build business, startups like Product Refinery, but it also, you know, can create public, government innovation. But at the same time, the whole process created a lot of empathy and awareness for perspectives and experiences that people in our community have that one might not always think about. And so I thought that was really an important outcome from the hackathon that perhaps we hadn't initially thought about. That's not the only hackathon that we did together. We also worked on a project to try to create more recycling

Mhmm.

In Cincinnati. And you worked with Flywheel on a, hackathon around housing stability. So so there's so many things that we can innovate around, in government and in business. Tell us about how what you're doing now and, how you're continuing that innovative work in your role today.

Absolutely. So ever since I left the city, I'm with the Cincinnati Regional Chamber. We represent 15 counties in three states, and that's about, I think, 2,200,000 people, so that entire business ecosystem in this region. And my job is I'm vice president of government affairs and advocacy. And my work is to figure out what policies at the local, state, and federal level have impact on the business community so we can react to policies that are coming up and how it will impact the business community so we can push against it or push for it.

And we can also be proactive and offer up ideas of here's things that can help us and here's things that matter to us. So things that are important is going to be like housing. We need to be able to continue to grow as a region so that we can drive more tax revenue so that we can have more money to spend on things to make our region more vibrant and a better place to live. We want to be able to recruit talent to come here so that our companies continue to grow and thrive. We need to make sure we take care of the people who live here so it is a good environment because that is our future business leaders.

And, if we're taking care of the kids when they're young in the most formative years and they're growing up in healthy environments and staying in school and have great schools, then our businesses are going to be able to be taken care of because they're going to thrive later on in life. Another area that I'm very passionate about that we work on is childcare. That's a huge barrier for entry into the workforce, but if we can get people working, they can get the paychecks. Going home create more stability for families. Businesses can be far more productive.

And then you get more tax revenue going to the government, which then can then spend it on big ideas, big things to create a much more vibrant community.

Wow. Yeah, you're absolutely right. The childcare I'm a working mom, also. I know you are. It's it's always top of mind at all stages of your child's development. You know, balancing those needs can be really challenging. And we do miss out on a lot when we we don't have parents in the workforce because they don't have access to that childcare.

Absolutely. So the data is, in Ohio, it's a $3,900,000,000 economic impact without So that is loss of productivity. That is people not entering the workforce or taking on more hours or being employed full time. There was a survey done recently that shows 70 not seventeen, seventy seven-zero percent of mothers in Ohio would work more or go back into the workforce if they had access to quality, reliable child care. So think about that impact.

And so that, I think, is a really cool opportunity in the future to drive more innovation in that space because there's been so many groups working on that for so long. And businesses feel the impact. And then the human services that have been advocating for this for a really long time, they feel the impact. And there's an opportunity to come together with the startup ecosystem in the same way we did before with litter and recycling to innovate here. And if you look at policy from the state level, they have to deal with these urban areas and the childcare challenges in an urban area, which a majority of them are going to be center based, and then the challenges of child care in these rural areas, which are going to be more in home, you know, the neighborhood house that has the few kids on the street or the grandmother that has multiple children in the home, and being able to balance that.

So I'm excited to try to figure out where we can innovate in that space and bridge that urban rural divide and be able to create policy that impacts and can help and enhance child care in both atmospheres. Wow.

It's fantastic to know that the business community, like the Chamber of Commerce, is a great representation of the businesses in our region. And, you know, it sounds like you're really driving some creative thinking there on how we can create an environment where businesses can thrive. And that involves some of these social issues. Right? So Flywheel is a social enterprise hub, and we're all about championing innovation in spaces that are social. And so it's great to hear that the Chamber of Commerce is tackling some of these things that will enable businesses to thrive on a number of different levels.

That's why flywheel is so important because if you have that mindset of understanding and bringing in that innovative mindset and the talent that you recruit in your ecosystem and then pull in these business challenges or government challenges, you can solve so many problems and create better economy, create better outcomes for just the people that live here, people in our region, people in our state or across the country. And that's why what you do is so critical to being able to solve some of these problems and just think of it in a completely different way than the people who have, you you almost have the tunnel vision of people thinking the same thing all the time. So I love the bright minds, the new ideas that come in from the work that Flywheel does.

We always say that there's no greater disruptor than an entrepreneur.

Absolutely. Important. And that's why I love this convening of the minds that you get from something like a flywheel or Syntravuz in government, local governments, and in the business community. There's so much opportunity there.

Let's go back and and dive a little deeper into, startup founders and the way that they can innovate, around social issues. Let's talk about the housing stabilization hackathon. How did that come to be? What was what was the driver of the idea?

So the way the city of Cincinnati funds human services is it's it kind of is all over the map, and a lot of nonprofits will submit proposals of how they're going to spend the money. And a lot of times, most of them get the same amount of money, but it's so many different nonprofits that you're funding. So you're spreading that money very thin, and you are taking care of the problem, reacting to the problem, but there's no money left to really go after the problem farther, much farther upstream to try to get to the prevention stage. And so what we decided is we wanted to just try something new. It was a pilot. And we took a big chunk of the money and put it aside and created what we called the Impact Award. So rather than like $20,000 $50,000 here, here, here, here with all these groups, we kind of skimmed some off the top and took $1,000,000 and said, Okay, over the course of three years, we'll give you $1,000,000 to the best application. And we put out a problem statement. And the problem statement was, How can we prevent eviction? Because what we know is it costs about $800 to keep someone in their home.

If they've gotten eviction notice, on average, it costs about $800 to solve that challenge, keep them in their home at a 90% success rate. If someone has already been evicted but they're staying at a friend's house, staying at a family member's house, they're cohabitating, it costs about $1,600 to step in and help that person get back on their feet at a ninety five percent success rate. If we wait until someone has been evicted, they don't have friends or family to go to, and they're in a shelter or some sort of temporary housing, it costs us $4,700 on average per person with a success rate of about sixty six percent to eighty two percent. So, if you just look at strictly the business side of things, it makes so much sense to spend the $800 to keep someone in their home, keep more stabilization, particularly if it's family and kids involved. Because what you see, especially if people get evicted and then they're going shelter to shelter, kids aren't going to school or they're switching schools constantly.

So you can't even put numbers around that for the long term trajectory of that child of having to live in those different types of unstable environments. So what we said is we put the problem statement together and said, help us figure out how we can prevent evictions so we can spend our money in a much smarter way and be able to help more people and try to prevent ending up with people, particularly children, in shelters later on because then you have far less money to spend. We also said something that'll get you higher points on your RFP when you come back is if you team up with other nonprofits and other groups in the city. Because we wanted to see far more collaboration and just come up with new ideas. And so Strategies Send Homelessness, which is a phenomenal organization, and we're very lucky in Cincinnati to have this.

They are a model nationwide. They have been funded by some really prestigious groups from across the country. And they came in and they pulled some partners together, including Flywheel, on this application. And they won the grant. And that's why we launched that hackathon.

And we had entrepreneurs from all over compete to come up with new ideas to figure out how to prevent eviction. So if you think of, it's not just the social impact, but it's more efficient use of very limited taxpayer dollars. You have the human impact, the long term trajectory of these kids. But you're also creating a new business model that can be replicated in municipalities around the world. Everyone has this problem.

There is a housing crisis everywhere. And to be able to innovate in that space, create this new model, it's a win all across the board for so many different groups. And it helps our business community as well to then be able to have more stable workforce, which helps create a more vibrant business community.

That's fantastic. Would would you say that workforce is a top issue for businesses locally?

Absolutely. Absolutely. And there's so many different aspects of that. Is there you know, if they need to be able to grow, do they have the talent here? If they need to bring talent in, do we have a place for people to move? We have a housing crisis. There's a huge housing gap. It's hard to recruit new people here because there's no place for them to live. If you have a workforce here, are they in stable housing? If they're not stable in their housing, depending on the pay range of your jobs or because you have the crunch and you have really high demand and a short supply, housing costs are through the roof. So a lot of people can't afford to live in the housing that's nearby where they work. You need a robust public transit system to be able to get people to and from jobs. You need really good school systems. So there's so many different aspects to be able to have a strong workforce. You need good schools and universities to be able to train that.

So doing these little bits of innovation and partnering with these entrepreneurs that we have in Cincinnati and programs like Flywheel really help us solve a lot of those challenges that we see more in the human services world. But it actually has a massive impact on our economy, on our government, on the businesses that are here, and creates a more thriving, you know, region for us. There's so much opportunity.

So true. Your your your vision is always so clear, Liz. It always amazes me how clear it is to you and how you're able to see the way to solutions and and really mobilize people around those solutions. And you did a wonderful job of that as a city council member, and we're all very grateful to that. And we know that you're going to do a fabulous job for the, Chamber of Commerce in the same way. So thank you from Flywheel and everybody in Greater Cincinnati for all the work that you do to make our community better, and thanks for being here today.

Well, thank you, and thank you to Flywheel because the work that you do is so critical. I said it earlier, and I'll say it again. You are helping solve so many of these challenges. And it's so much more than just a program or just one startup because of the impact that it can have on just human beings and the trajectory of kids and success of government and success of business in the entire region is so critical.

On the Fly! is produced by Joey Scarillo with music composed by Ben Hammer, Recorded at 1819 Innovation Hub in Cincinnati, Ohio, courtesy of the University of Cincinnati.