Urban Evolution Episode 5: The Post Pandemic City: A Conversation with Tom Fisher, Director, Minnesota Design Center at the University of Minnesota

Urban Evolution Podcast
Tom Fisher, Director of the Minnesota Design Center at the University of Minnesota

The Coronavirus pandemic has accelerated changes in many industries and in our daily lives. Tom Fisher, Director of the Minnesota Design Center at the University of Minnesota is a professor and former dean at the university. His research has focused on sustainable architecture, design ethics and community based service design. He shares insights on what a post pandemic city might look like, and how lessons from past pandemics and health events can help shape our future.

Download a transcript of this episode.

Tom Fisher: https://designcenter.design.umn.edu/people/fisher.html
Minnesota Design Center: https://designcenter.design.umn.edu/
Destination Medical Center: https://dmc.mn/

Olde Brick House Irish Pub and Restaurant brings authentic experience to downtown Rochester’s Heart of the City

General

Even with a great location in downtown Rochester, opening a restaurant during a pandemic comes with plenty of challenges. For the staff at Olde Brick House, 19 1st Ave SW, those challenges happened to include advanced furniture assembly and metric conversions.

Inside the newly opened restaurant, “Everything that a customer sees was built over in Dublin, Ireland,” says Paula Rathman, director of operations and general manager of Olde Brick House.

DMC, City of Rochester and Winona State University partner to offer training on inclusive workforce participation planning

Press Releases

Free Online Workshop is January 20, 2021

Photo by Fagan Studios

Destination Medical Center (DMC) and the City of Rochester are partnering with Winona State University Adult & Continuing Education to offer Inclusive Workforce Practices: Why You Need a Workforce Participation Plan, a free online workshop on January 20, 2021, from 2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. This workshop is for CEOs, presidents, vice presidents, managers, recruiters, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) / Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) /Affirmative Action (AA) officers, and other human resource generalists and specialists across multiple sectors who want to learn how to make workforce diversity support organizational success.

Sybil L. Dunlop, a national thought leader on DEI issues will be facilitating the workshop. Dunlop helped found Greene Espel’s Diversity & Inclusion practice which helps workplaces design and implement DEI programs to meet organizational goals, and she has spoken on this topic to more than 100 audiences across the nation.

New leader kicks off next phase of Destination Medical Center Initiative

Press Releases
Patrick Seeb
Patrick Seeb, DMC EDA Executive Director

(Rochester, Minn.) January 4, 2021 – The largest public-private economic development partnership in Minnesota history marks a significant milestone today, when Patrick Seeb officially steps into the role of executive director of the Destination Medical Center Economic Development Agency (DMC EDA), following the retirement of Lisa Clarke.

Seeb is a veteran of economic development. Before taking the DMC helm, he served as the organization’s senior director of economic development and placemaking.

Winona State University Expands Presence in Downtown Rochester: Five Questions with Jeanine Gangeness, Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs

General

Winona State University Graduate Studies recently announced it would be expanding its presence in downtown Rochester, signing a lease for additional office space in the campus building on South Broadway Avenue. Jeanine Gangeness, PhD, Associate Vice President for Academic Affairs – Rochester and Dean for the School of Graduate Studies at Winona State University explains more about the university’s commitment to downtown Rochester.

DMC: How is Winona State University Graduate Studies utilizing its new space on the 2nd floor of the 400 S. Broadway Building?

Gangeness: The Winona State University Department of Graduate Nursing have moved their faculty offices into our expanded space on the second floor of the WSU-Rochester on Broadway campus space. 

E1 Network Connects and Supports Southeast Minnesota Entrepreneurs

General

Functioning like a two-way highway of support between Rochester and its surrounding communities, the Entrepreneurs First (E1) Network aims to leverage resources of member organizations to elevate and promote entrepreneurs at every level of their journey – a daunting, but necessary, task in a year rife with unpredictability.

The network launched this spring, with support from the statewide initiative, LaunchMN, just as COVID-19 was revealing how tightly technology and resiliency are now tied. Members include a conglomerate of startups, universities, and nonprofits across 11 counties.