Ottawa has been selected as one of 21 semi-finalists for the Intelligent Community of the Year award, given out annually by the Intelligent Community Forum.
The city is one of eight Canadian municipalities on this year’s list. Others on the list are five communities from Taiwan, two each from the United States and Australia, and one from Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand and Sweden.
As Smart21 Communities, the ICF has identified these cities as being leaders in using technology in order to adapt to the new demands and challenges caused by the 21st century. The ICF selected this year’s Smart21 from a pool of 380 applicants.
“We are very excited to name 11 new communities from North America, Europe and Asia to this year’s Smart21,” ICF co-founder Robert Bell said in a press release issued on Oct. 21.
The winner of this year’s competition will be announced in June 2016 at a ceremony in Columbus, Ohio, the 2015 Intelligent Community of the Year.
Nominations for the annual award opened in July, with communities being evaluated based on six intelligent-community indicators: digital equality, broadband, innovation, knowledge workforce, sustainability and advocacy.
Invest Ottawa, a City of Ottawa-funded economic development agency, spearheaded Ottawa’s application.
According to Ryan Gibson, the communications manager at Invest Ottawa, the city meets the majority of the indicators set out by the ICF, making it a good candidate for the award.
Gibson cites the fact that 61 per cent of Ottawa’s workforce has a post-secondary degree, with 128,000 of them having master’s degrees and PhDs.
“Canada has the most educated workforce in the world, and Ottawa has the most educated workforce in the country,” Gibson says. “We also have the second largest concentration of scientists and engineers in North America, [with] Silicon Valley being first.”
Adding to Ottawa’s appeal is the fact that the city is a hub for innovation. Ottawa is home to 65 federal research labs, as well as more than 1,750 technology companies, Gibson says.
Invest Ottawa was motivated to nominate the city due to the international exposure it could bring, Gibson says.
“My role is to tell the story of why Ottawa is the best place to work, play and grow, but another party agreeing with me adds credence to that message,” says Gibson.
The next stage of the competition involves each city providing the ICF with data collected via an extensive questionnaire. Based on this, the ICF will reveal the top seven highest scoring communities in February 2016.
The top seven will receive a visit from one of the ICF’s co-founders, who will then submit a written report. This report goes to the ICF’s jury of experts from around the globe, which votes for the eventual winner.
Each year the ICF has a theme that functions as the seventh criteria by which communities are evaluated. This year’s theme is “From Revolution to Renaissance,” and refers to the ways in which communities are planning for the future in the midst of an ever-changing world.
“The idea behind that is looking at not necessarily what communities have done now to get where they are,” says Matthew Owen, operations manager at the ICF. “But to look at their planning for the future, and to look at their plans for what’s still to come.”
This year marks the fourth time since 2006 that Ottawa has been named a Smart21 Community.