Columbus is bolstering its Smart City efforts with a new point person to lead the multimillion-dollar initiative, and giving its staffers a new home in up-and-coming Franklinton.

Mayor Andrew Ginther announced during a recent press conference that Mike Stevens, a former deputy director of the Columbus Department of Development, would return to the city as Columbus' first chief innovation officer to lead the Smart City effort. He has been CEO of Lake County Partners, a nonprofit economic-development organization outside Chicago, since leaving the city in 2012.

He'll be paid $182,000 a year, with $30,000 of his salary funded by the Columbus Partnership, the economic development organization made up of area CEOs and business executives.

Stevens will work in tandem with Mark Patton, a former JobsOhio official who was hired as vice president of Smart Cities at the Columbus Partnership.

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