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Request for Assistance in Designing the GLIN Economy Subject Catalog


TO:		Economic Development Interests in the Great Lakes Region 
		and Great Lakes Information Network Partners

FROM:		Carol Ratza, GLIN Director

RE:		Request for Assistance in Designing the GLIN Economy 
		Subject Catalog             

DATE:		February 10, 1997


I hope you have had the opportunity to visit the Great Lakes Information
Network (GLIN) web site at http://www.great-lakes.net and found its many
links to agencies and organizations in the binational region helpful in
your efforts to locate data, information and individuals. GLIN linkages
span three main topics of interest to those of us who live and work in the
Great Lakes region: environment, economy and education. To date, GLIN
development has focused on the environmental online resources. With a
great deal of assistance from major environmental and natural resources
agencies and organizations in the region, we have been very successful,
and GLIN environmental resources are now popular with everyone from
policymakers and scientists to school children. Now, with funding provided
by the Ameritech Foundation, we are launching full-scale development of
the economic indices and linkages. 

It is in the interest of building a strong, representative and useful 
economic section on GLIN that I am writing to you.

We have developed an Economy Subject Catalog following the model we used
in designing the environment section of GLIN. The Economy Subject Catalog
was developed by reviewing, among other resources, the organizational
structures of the Great Lakes state agencies involved with economic
development, and reflects our effort to merge the various organizational
models into one list. 

Now we need your help. Would you and appropriate members of your
organization's online resources design team review the Economy Subject
Catalog and consider whether it accurately reflects issues and topics of
importance to the Great Lakes economy? Your input in helping us shape a
comprehensive catalog will help us publicize your data and information
throughout GLIN.  Once the catalog has been reviewed, GLIN will populate
the topics with appropriate links to your online resources, facilitating
searching, navigating, and cross-referencing data and information from the
highest quality sources in the region. 
  
Our goal is to link to the very best resources related to the economy of 
the Great Lakes region. If you have done a World Wide Web search on an 
economic development term such as workforce development' and been 
inundated with useless results,  you will readily understand why GLIN is 
so important: it offers a regional slice of the Internet that is tailored 
exactly to meet your needs, and the needs of your constituents. 

Please view the draft economy subject catalog as a starting point.  If it
doesn't work for your organization, tell us what will. Feel free to tear
this list apart and modify it any way you'd like. We do not expect every
agency or organization to have data online in every category. In fact, no
one will. However, when responding, please highlight those categories for
which you have online information. 

You'll find a copy of the Economy Subject Catalog available directly from
the GLIN home page at http://www.great-lakes.net.  Please send your
comments to Mandy Grewal at the Great Lakes Commission via fax, mail or
e-mail (mgrewal@glc.org) by Tuesday, March 4, 1997. 

If you would like to discuss the effort further, please give me a 
call at (313) 665-9135, or send an e-mail to cratza@glc.org. I look 
forward to your assistance in making the GLIN economy section the useful 
tool that we know it can be. 



**************************************************************
Carol Ratza
Great Lakes Information Network (GLIN) Director
Great Lakes Commission
Argus II Building                  key words: Great Lakes; air
400 Fourth St.                     toxics; Internet; 
Ann Arbor, MI 48103-4816           Web; RAPIDS; GLIN;
p: 313.665.9135                    public policy; distributed
f: 313.665.4370                    networking; coffee.
e: cratza@glc.org                 
http://www.great-lakes.net/
**************************************************************