Twin Cities Compass

Measuring progress. Inspiring action.

The Twin Cities region has long been known for offering a high quality of life – but will it remain so? How do we know we are moving in the right direction?

Compass gives everyone in the Twin Cities – policymakers, business and community leaders, and concerned individuals who live and work here – a common foundation to identify, understand, and act on community issues that affect our region by:

Providing unbiased, credible information about how our region is faring
Tracking trends and measuring progress on issues that impact our quality of life.
Identifying disparities by including trend data by race, place, age, gender and income whenever possible.
Providing resources for addressing issues.

PROJECT DEVELOPMENT

Momentum for this initiative began in 2004 when a delegation of community leaders from Minnesota visited Boston and learned about the Boston Indicators Project. The Itasca Project, several foundations, and other groups interested in the Twin Cities’ vitality and global competitiveness turned to Wilder Research to implement a similar project for our region.

More than 300 volunteers from academia, private industry, public and nonprofit sectors helped to shape the project, serving on topic and technical advisory committees. Twin Cities Compass volunteers

ways to use this site

Get facts that matter
Twin Cities Compass gives measurable information in each topic area that shows us trends in the region over time. These facts are divided into two categories—Key Measures and More Measures. What’s the difference? Key Measures were chosen by topic advisory groups as the most credible and compelling based on criteria developed by a technical committee. More Measures provide additional data in order to gain a more in-depth understanding of the issue, to improve our quality of life.
More about the data
Measure selection as of Feb. 2009

Learn how others have tackled an issue
In each of the nine topic areas, there is an Ideas at Work section, a compendium of local and national strategies and initiatives, backed by research and evaluation, that have been implemented to reach goals and improve quality of life.

Dig deeper
Delve into our virtual library, which contains reports and studies on a wide variety of topics. Don’t see something you think would be of value to others? Recommend it to us.

Take action
Check out events, meetings, seminars and lectures happening in the Twin Cities region in the Community Connection Calendar, provided by the Citizens League. Peruse our Get Involved section for ideas on how to donate your time and talent to solving a problem and improving our region. See which organizations are working in that area.

Improve the Twin Cities by improving Compass!

Have an idea to enhance our web site? Do you know of a study, report or initiative you think would interest others? Do you have ways to get involved that you’d like to share with others? Have praise to lavish or a bone to pick? Let us know! Join our mailing list or sign up for an RSS feed on our homepage ( all new reports) or by topic of interest (on each topic section library page).

VIDEO HIGHLIGHT:
SHAPING THE PROJECT
Community leaders tell why they got involved.