David Warm / Dec 04 2011
For Release Sunday, December 4, 2011
Citiwire.net
Across America, regional communities are actively envisioning and investing in new patterns of sustainable growth and development that aim to promote economic competitiveness, environmental integrity and social opportunity. For the most part, these efforts are homegrown, prompted by a host of new market forces, social realities and environmental constraints.
In recent years, the federal government has stepped up its role in this process, bringing engaged leadership, yet also prompting questions about whether it should be involved in this arena. From my perspective, the answer is clear: federal leadership in fostering sustainable development is important to both the interests of the federal government and to the health of the nation.
There is a clear and compelling federal interest in promoting sustainable development as a proactive strategy to target and leverage federal investments in infrastructure, innovation and human capacity, as a protective strategy to guard the efficacy of federal assets and investments, and as a preemptive strategy to minimize the need to expend federal resources to mitigate the environmental, social and economic consequences of inefficient and unsustainable development practices.
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Bill Barnes / Nov 25 2011
For Release Friday, November 25, 2011
Citiwire.net
Among the congenial regional sages at the October Citistates convening at Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s Pocantico Conference Center, I felt I could admit to a long-time failing — I’ve been a messy regionalist.
By messy, I mean “devoid of neatness and precision.” That sounds right — regional problem-solving is usually complicated, difficult, frustrating and full of surprises, and often not successful. In other words, it’s like most human collective action endeavors.
Addressing regional challenges is also urgent and important and worthy of special attention. But we would do well to acknowledge and accept the reality of what Dan Gilmartin, executive director of the Michigan Municipal League, calls the “on the ground stuff” in the regionalism picture — the mix of grit and public interest vision that constitutes regional efforts. It’s really not about making nice; it’s about working through competing interests and values and about dealing with often fierce disagreements on matters of mutual concern.
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Mary Newsom / Nov 19 2011
For Release Saturday, November 19, 2011
Citiwire.net
It’s as obvious as the air we breathe, as basic as the fluid geography of a watershed, as clear as the connection between a new highway and the strip shopping centers and subdivisions that cluster nearby.
But then again, the air flowing over city limits and state lines is invisible. And most people don’t stop to think that what goes down the kitchen sink or runs off a muddy construction site eventually flows into rivers or lakes and sometimes into other people’s drinking water supply. Even the idea that road building shapes how we live, work and shop is a foreign concept to most people.
In other words despite city limits, voting districts and state lines on maps, in the real world of air and water, of urban transportation and economies, city regions function in ways our American political systems may not recognize. Although environments, economies and living patterns create very real urban regions, those geographic areas don’t exist in the basic structure of the government of the United STATES. Under the Constitution, states have powers; cities don’t.
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William Stafford / Nov 12 2011
For Release Saturday, November 12, 2011
Citiwire.net
Rockefeller’s estate in Sleepy Hollow, New York was the perfect place to have a three-day discussion, a few days before Halloween, on the current situation in America’s metropolitan areas. Congress is bewitched, the public is spooked, and public budgets are being beheaded. Eek!
The opportunity to stay in Kykuit, Rockefeller’s mansion and now an historic site of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, was a great personal experience and reminded me that wealth was widely distributed throughout American history. The estate was once 3,000 acres but is now only 300 acres, the remainder a state park or still in the family.
Across a majestic view of the Hudson River and its valley is a unique geologic feature, the Palisades, a nearly 20-mile line of steep cliffs along the west side of the river. To prevent development on the top of the Palisades, the family purchased 18 miles of the bluff and gave it to the state for a linear state park. Read More »
Kathryn A. Foster / Nov 05 2011
For Release Saturday, November 5, 2011
Citiwire.net
Maybe it’s middle-aged jaundice that makes me think we’ve been having, since the time of Uruk, the same conversation with the same people about the “problems and promise” of metropolitan city-states.
So I had modest hope for another confab on the subject, even if organizers from the Citistates Group were taking it seriously enough to raise foundation funds, limit participants in number, provide a lengthy position paper — and two rejoinders! — on states and regions, and reserve the hospitality of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s Pocantico Conference Center in Tarrytown, New York, for the late October retreat. At least, I figured, the fall foliage would be nice.
Rather than retread, though, the experience was delightful for its diversities. A bit like regions themselves.
Diversity One occurred on the northbound Amtrak Regional out of D.C’s Union Station. Two fellow participants and I searched for seats, chatting unknowingly in what turned out to be the Quiet Car, a place where cell phones and unmuted conversation are prohibited.
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David Boyd / Oct 28 2011
For Release Friday, October 28, 2011
Citiwire.net
Anyone who has ever watched an episode of The West Wing or followed the national network’s television coverage on election night has a general idea of how common the use of polls has become to the policy formulation process in our country. Our leaders and public officials have turned to the tools of marketers to help decipher which direction the figurative winds are blowing before they step into the fray. So why wouldn’t planning and smart growth advocates do the same?
Last fall, Smart Growth America (SGA) did just that. It’s a coalition representing nearly 40 national organizations and many state and local groups that share an interest in “creating and maintaining great neighborhoods in which to live and work,” in building coalitions to “bring smart growth practices to more communities nationwide.” SGA commissioned a national survey intended to gain a better understanding about the role of sustainable communities in our nation’s economic recovery.
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Jay Walljasper / Oct 22 2011
For Release Saturday, October 22, 2011
Citiwire.net
Minneapolis’s Midtown Greenway is popular with both commuters and recreational bikers.
People across the country were surprised last year when Bicycling magazine named Minneapolis America’s “#1 Bike City”, beating out Portland, Oregon, which had claimed the honor for many years. Shock that a place in the heartland could outperform cities on the coasts was matched by widespread disbelief that biking was even possible in a state famous for its ferocious winters.
But this skepticism fades with a close look at the facts. Close to four percent of Minneapolis residents bike to work, according to census data. That’s an increase of almost 33 percent since 2007, and 500 percent since 1980.
At least one-third of those commuters ride at least some days during the winter, according to federally funded research conducted by Bike Walk Twin Cities. Even on the coldest days about one-fifth are out on their bikes.
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Anthony Flint / Oct 14 2011
For Release Friday, October 14, 2011
Citiwire.net
One of the fastest growing lists in Washington these days may well be the Obama administration initiatives that are under fire or have had to be pulled back. The president banded together the EPA, DOT, DOE, and HUD; the House attempted to strip all funding associated with that coordination. The president vowed action on climate change and air pollution; the EPA postponed tougher boiler and incinerator emissions rules. The president wanted to pivot to a new green economy, to encourage innovation for a post-carbon world, like the Chinese are doing — and instead we have the debacle of Solyndra.
So why should another program that so many love to deride as a liberal, elitist, slightly European idea — establishing a true, high-speed inter-city rail network in the U.S. — be any different? Read More »
Roberta Brandes Gratz / Sep 24 2011
For Release Saturday, September 24, 2011
Citiwire.net
By God they got it! They finally got it! Bravo to National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Rocco Landsman, his staff and the consortium of government agencies, foundations and corporations for their pledge to invest generously in locally-formed, modest-scale cultural enterprises as generators of urban rebirth.
This group’s new program, ArtPlace, will distribute $11.5 million in grants and $12 million in loans to programs that integrate the arts into local efforts in transportation, housing, community development and job creation. For decades, exactly these kinds of efforts have been a prime renewer of downtowns. Denver, Sante Fe, Portland, Pittsburgh, Chattanooga. Name a reborn downtown district and you’ll find similar modest catalysts that added up to big change.
And this is not just about artists or even the arts as narrowly defined. It’s about the ancillary services and businesses that creative work attracts and, critically, it is about energizing an area so that all kinds of activities are attracted to locate there.
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Mary Newsom / Sep 17 2011
For Release Saturday, September 17, 2011
Citiwire.net
SOFIA, Bulgaria — Residents of this graffiti-pocked capital awoke one recent Saturday to find their controversial Monument to the Soviet Army had been painted to look like Superman, Santa Claus and other American pop-culture icons.
Reactions ranged from delight at the anti-authoritarian creativity to finger-wagging at vandalism to a dour scolding from the Russian embassy. Was it freedom of expression — a witty political statement? Or was it just hooliganism — another example of a culture of disrespect for the city’s deteriorating public spaces?
More than 20 years after the fall of communism, Sofians confront one of the intrinsic tensions found in any democratic society: How to support the creative messiness of individual freedom and free expression without losing a sense of collective order? It’s a tension American society hasn’t yet resolved after 235 years of self-government.
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