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 Each month, we profile a national organization with which ARS has partnered to reach a broader audience capable of initiating action across sectors and jurisdictions. (For a full listing of ARS Strategic Partners, click the About Us button on the home page of this website.) In profile this month is CEOs for Cities, a national bipartisan alliance of mayors, university presidents and nonprofit leaders that seeks to advance the economic competitiveness of cities. The organization was founded in the spring of 2001 during a time of hopeful trends in such key indices of urban health as population, crime and employment, with a mission to strengthen and promote the public-private and government-neighborhood partnerships that had contributed to reversing a decades-long pattern of social and economic decline in central cities.
Thus, CEOs for Cities serves as a national forum for convening thoughtful business, government and nonprofit leaders to systematically compile and analyze data on innovative partnership approaches, share this information with peers, and channel valuable lessons to government at all levels in order to influence facilitative public policy. This process is achieved through national and local meetings of its growing base of 70-plus principals, drawn from a current membership of 15 major U.S. cities. Ideas and strategies emerging from these meetings are further developed through commissioned research conducted by CEOs for Cities strategic partners, such as McKinsey & Co. and the Brookings Institution.
CEOs for Cities has strengthened cross-sector leadership networks nationally and locally, commissioned and disseminated research and best practices profiles on crucial economic development topics, and begun to serve as a new voice for central cities. The organizations research and policy activities focus on three areas:
Best Practices and Strategiesresearch that highlights best practices in investment partnerships, offering new strategic frameworks and recommendations for urban leaders. This work is based on the proposition that the competitive opportunities of cities may be found in their core assets, such as their people, universities and hospitals, high-technology clusters and economic hubs, retail market opportunities, and available land, to name a few. CEOs for Cities suggests that these assets are best leveraged when the public and private sectors invest in them in a coordinated fashion. Among the organizations reports in this area are What the IT Revolution Means for Regional Economic Development (2003) and Innovative Regional Alliances Strengthening Urban Economies (2002).
Trends. CEOs for Cities asserts that the era of urban decline is over. After decades of decline, a wide range of urban indices from increases in population and affordable housing to decreases in crime reflect an American urban resurgence. Much of this upswing is due to new partnerships across sectors that have helped enable community development corporations and other grassroots organizations to take charge of their neighborhoods in bold and creative ways. CEOs for Cities packages both new data reflecting the comeback of cities and trends in cross-sector partnerships to encourage their replication. Relevant research reports on recent urban trends include Cities and Economic Prosperity: A Data Scan on the Role of Cities in Regional and National Economies (2001) and Urban Economic Prospects in the Knowledge Economy (2000).
Federal Policy Agenda. CEOs for Cities urges that all federal agencies think creatively about how policies can support market-based, locally driven, flexible strategies, and that they work together on this new assets-based approach to urban America. While the organization recognizes that most of the hard work of revitalizing America's cities rightly falls upon local and state government, it maintains that the federal government can be an important partner and enabler. In the area of federal urban policy, CEOs for Cities has published Competitive Cities: A New Urban Agenda (2001).
CEOs for Cities also works to strengthen higher education partnerships with business and government, help urban areas reclaim underutilized land, advise regions on attractive strategic opportunities, and serve as a general clearinghouse on urban affairs. Ann Lang is executive director of CEOs for Cities. For more information, visit their website at www.ceosforcities.org or call .
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