| Building Maryland’s future, together |
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In this issue
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► Opening Message from Francesca Ioffreda, Chief Innovation Officer |
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► Tool Spotlight: Maryland Community Compass |
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► Partnership Spotlight: Maryland Innovation Summit |
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► Research Spotlight: Maryland Business AI Benchmark |
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► Maryland on the National Stage |
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You are receiving this newsletter as a key partner or collaborator of the Maryland State Innovation Team. Over the past year, many of you have shared that you'd like a way to stay connected to our work, and we're excited to make that happen with these quarterly updates.
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Opening Message
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"Building Maryland’s future, together" |
In our last newsletter, we shared a question we kept hearing across Maryland: how will AI change the way people work, learn, and build their futures here? Governor Moore’s answer was that Maryland would meet this moment proactively, thoughtfully and with hope. This fall, we put that commitment into action.
Between June and July, we surveyed nearly 300 senior decision-makers at AI-engaged organizations across the state. The findings, published in the Maryland Business AI Benchmark Report, give Maryland its most in-depth evidence base yet on how businesses are adopting AI, how it is affecting productivity, and what they expect it to mean for hiring and the workforce. The results lay the groundwork for State leaders to develop policies, programs, and services that meet the real needs of employers and workers.
In September, we launched the expanded Maryland Community Compass, a free platform for developers and small businesses that brings together neighborhood data, thousands of funding programs, and other resources all in one place. We designed it alongside the developers, nonprofits, and public servants who use it, through months of interviews, site visits, and testing sessions. The Compass gives them new tools and features to get neighborhood projects off the ground. More than 20,000 people have used it, and we have deployed it alongside $14 million in state funding for communities across Maryland.
Then, on October 1, Governor Moore and our team convened the Maryland Innovation Summit. Nearly 400 leaders from government, business, labor, philanthropy, and academia came together to chart how Maryland will meet the changes AI is bringing. It was the first major gathering since the Governor released his AI principles: protecting our people, centering our workers, and keeping our kids safe. Over the course of the day, the conversation ranged from protecting kids and improving government services to preparing workers and growing businesses. As Governor Moore put it, “Maryland is choosing to lead.”
No single team can do this work alone. It will take all of us, across sectors and across agencies, with Marylanders’ voices at the center of what we build. We’re grateful for the partners who worked alongside us to shape early answers into tangible results, and we hope you’ll reach out to collaborate on the work ahead.
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Francesca Ioffreda
Chief Innovation Officer, State of Maryland
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Tool Spotlight
Maryland Community Compass
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In September, the Innovation Team was proud to launch the expanded Maryland Community Compass, a free neighborhood development platform, alongside Governor Wes Moore at the Justice Thurgood Marshall Amenity Center in Baltimore. Initially designed for Maryland’s child care and fresh food business owners, the expanded platform centralizes data insights, funding resources, and support for the people investing in Maryland: entrepreneurs, developers, nonprofits, and the agencies that back them.
We were honored to be joined by leaders from across Maryland’s community development ecosystem as we unveiled the new Compass features, including:
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Neighborhood Insights, a map-based overview of over 1,400 Maryland neighborhoods with nearly 60 metrics on land use, development costs and activity, community priorities, and more.
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Site Insights, an AI-enabled parcel evaluator that assesses any of Maryland’s 2.4 million properties against zoning codes, environmental records, and site-specific funding opportunities.
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Find Funding, a comprehensive database of over 2,600 incentive programs from more than 100 public and private sources.
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A national first. On September 9, the Compass data connector went live in Anthropic’s Directory, making Maryland the first state government to publish one. People using AI assistants, like Claude, can now get answers grounded in official Maryland data.
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We are incredibly grateful to the non-profit leaders, community development organizations, and developers who partnered with us throughout the research and co-design phases of this project, making this launch possible.
We invite you to share the Compass with your networks, and to reach out to us to schedule a demo with your community development organization.
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Partnership Spotlight
Maryland Innovation Summit
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In early October, Governor Moore and the Innovation Team convened nearly 400 leaders from government, business, labor, philanthropy, and academia for The Maryland Innovation Summit: Shaping the AI Future Together. The gathering followed closely on the Governor’s September announcement of the Moore-Miller Administration’s AI Framework, which set out three guiding principles for responsible AI in Maryland: protecting our people, centering our workers, and keeping our kids safe. The Summit brought together the national and Maryland leaders the State will partner with to put those principles into practice.
Over the course of the day, attendees worked through three central questions:
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How Maryland can invest in workers, protect their rights, and expand opportunity as AI reshapes the economy
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How the state can grow its economy by helping businesses use AI while safeguarding workers
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What models of AI governance best balance risk and opportunity
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In his keynote, Governor Moore announced a bipartisan council of governors on AI, which he will co-chair with Indiana Governor Mike Braun through the National Governors Association. He also committed to a standing Labor-Management Committee with State employee unions and $4 million this year for training and community Cyber and AI Clinics.
We were honored to welcome speakers from leading state and national organizations including The Rockefeller Foundation, Anthropic, Fearless, LinkedIn, Code for America, Johns Hopkins University, the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, the Greater Baltimore Committee, Blue Meridian Partners, Omidyar Network, Bainum Family Foundation, Maryland State & DC AFL-CIO, Common Sense Media, and so many others, who shared insights on how AI is reshaping their respective industries.
Attendees also heard from leaders from across the Moore-Miller administration, including Secretaries Harry Coker, Jonny Dorsey, Katie Savage, Portia Wu, Carmel Martin, and Elena Quiroz-Livanis, and were joined by several elected officials, including Lt. Governor Aruna Miller, Congresswoman April McClain Delaney, Comptroller Brooke Lierman, and State Senator Katie Fry Hester.
The Summit is one step in the Moore-Miller Administration’s broader work to meet this moment, building on a record that has made Maryland one of the most proactive states in the country on AI.
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Research Spotlight
Maryland Business AI Benchmark
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This summer, the Innovation Team surveyed nearly 300 senior AI decision-makers at Maryland businesses to understand the depth of their AI adoption, its effect on productivity, anticipated hiring impacts, barriers to further adoption, and needs from the State. On October 1st, we published findings in the Maryland Business AI Benchmark, a report that details how Maryland employers are actually using AI and provides an evidence base for future state programs, products, and resources.
The Benchmark found:
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Adoption is nearly universal, but early. 91% of businesses use some form of AI, though 58% remain at basic use.
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Productivity gains are real but modest. 92% of regular users report a positive impact, most describing it as slight.
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Leaders expect workforce evolution, not reduction. 64% plan to have existing employees do more with AI; just 4% expect AI to reduce headcount.
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Businesses are looking to the State. Capital and technical assistance top the list of most helpful supports.
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Even among the state’s most AI-engaged businesses, most are still early in their transformation — which means the bulk of the impact on productivity, output, and the workforce still lies ahead. As Maryland moves from framework to implementation, the Benchmark gives state leaders a Maryland-specific evidence base for what comes next.
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National Spotlight
Maryland on the National Stage
We were proud to feature the work we’re driving at the following national forums:
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Working-Class Insights Forum: Moderated by David Williams of the Lafayette Square Institute, Francesca joined national economic mobility leaders — including Raj Chetty of Opportunity Insights, Della Clark of The Enterprise Center, and Capital One’s Kerone Vatel — for the panel “Creating a National Economic Mobility Agenda: Lessons from Local, State, and National Practice.” She discussed practical, government-level applications of the economic mobility research Dr. Chetty presented, and what Maryland is doing today to expand opportunity for families.
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State of GovTech 2026: Francesca joined a fireside conversation titled “How One of the Country’s Most Active States Moves Innovation from Pilot to Practice,” interviewed by Sherrod Davis, co-founder and CEO of EcoMap Technologies. She spoke about the team’s approach to conducting quantitative and qualitative research, convening stakeholders, and building solutions, programs, and products in service of Maryland residents.
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In the News
Recent Coverage
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The Daily Record
Maryland business leaders report AI expansion, not job cuts
Ahead of the Summit, The Daily Record previewed the Benchmark findings and spoke with the Innovation Team about how AI is changing the nature of work in Maryland.
Read the article →
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WBAL-TV
Governor Moore addresses AI at the Maryland Innovation Summit
WBAL covered the Governor’s keynote, including the new bipartisan governors’ council and key findings from the AI Benchmark.
Watch the story →
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CBS News Baltimore
Governor Moore launches a new AI-powered tool for community entrepreneurs
CBS covered the Compass launch and how the platform can save small developers the cost of early feasibility studies.
Read the story →
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The Baltimore Sun
Meet the Baltimore Sun’s 25 Women to Watch for 2026
Francesca was named to the Baltimore Sun’s 25 Women to Watch for 2026, a list spotlighting women leading across business, health care, education, activism, and the arts in the Baltimore region. The feature traces her path — from a Fulbright fellowship in Bogotá, Colombia to becoming Maryland’s first chief innovation officer — and how that experience shapes the team’s work to expand economic mobility for Maryland families.
Read the profile →
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Get Involved
Partner With Us: Current Projects
We don't just build for Marylanders; we build with them. Here's how you can get involved with our active projects right now:
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Child Care Workforce Co-Design
We are conducting research on ways to support the financial stability and security of early childhood educators. If you are an early childhood educator or child care business owner, we want to hear from you.
If you are a different type of community member and would like to share an idea about supporting the financial stability and security of early childhood educators, please email us at innovation.team@maryland.gov.
Take our 2-minute interest survey →
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Help Design Startup Accelerator for Displaced Workers
The Innovation Team is designing a new startup accelerator with RAISE US for Marylanders navigating a job loss who are interested in pursuing entrepreneurship. The program will help participants explore, launch, or grow a business with support like training, mentorship, a peer cohort, and AI tools. We are designing it with input from the people it is meant to serve, and we want to hear from you.
Take our 2-minute interest survey if you’d like to shape the startup accelerator →
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Apply for the MCIV Fund’s Second Cohort
Building on the successful pilot partnerships formed in Year 1, the Maryland Community Investment Venture (MCIV) Fund is now accepting interest forms for Cohort 2. For the first time, the Fund is open to fintechs serving consumers in low- and moderate-income communities, in addition to those serving small businesses. If you’re a fintech building inclusive financial solutions, complete our interest form below. Applicants will be considered for our Fintech Expo this November and up to $100,000 in grant funding for pilots.
Maryland state-chartered banks or credit unions interested in partnering can contact the Maryland Department of Labor’s Office of Financial Regulation directly for more information.
Complete the interest form →
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Tell Us About Your Experience with the Expanded Maryland Community Compass
Have you had a chance to explore the new Compass features — Neighborhood Insights, Site Insights, and Find Funding? Whether you’re a developer, a nonprofit leader, or part of a community development organization, we want to hear what’s working and what could be better as we continue to improve the platform.
Share your feedback →
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Stay Connected
How to Reach Us
We share new launches and interim updates regularly on our social channels. Join the conversation and follow us on LinkedIn and Instagram.
Want to share a partner success story, an upcoming event, or a useful tool with the team? To submit a brief write-up for consideration in the next newsletter, simply connect with us by replying directly to this email!
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