Cities need to be able to control their own destinies. That's the message from Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett in this interview with NPR. "Candidates and Washington in general are not talking about cities. Cities would do a lot better if they had more discretion." Cornett, who is the national president of the Republican Mayors Association, cited long-term capital issues like deferred maintenance and state-level cutbacks as crippling concerns not being addressed by political leaders.

For his part, Oklahoma City is a success story, having famously raised taxes to pay for amenities designed to improve quality of life and attract young, college-educated people to the city. The Kauffman Foundation recently named it the most entrepreneurial city in the country with the most start-ups per capita. 

So how did they do it?

"We've been able to convince the people in the suburbs that the vibrancy of the core is directly proportionate to the quality of life in the suburbs," Cornett said. "So the people in the suburbs are willing to invest in downtown."

Suburban sprawl may be contributing to the shrinking populations in post-industrial cities as much as the changing economy in those cities.  The Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland released a new study highlighting the importance of the core density on the overall population of the metropolitan region.  The report, which looked at census data from 1980-2010, found, “that growing cities have maintained dense urban centers, while shrinking cities have not.”  The study also highlights the importance of density on production.  As more businesses realize that declining population is detrimental to their interests, Kaid Benfield opines in The Atlantic Cities piece “Fixing the Rust Belt by Shrinking It” that we will soon see political policies focused on strengthening our core.

Calling it "a remarkable thing" that, given all of our choices about where to live, cities are so appealing, in this short video from CEOs for Cities' Fall National Meeting in Chicago, Harvard economist Ed Glaeser offers his ideas on the policies, both local and national, that would best enable cities' success. He calls on local policymakers to focus on "ephemeral" quality of life issues in addition to safety and schools so as to attract smart, entrepreneurial people. At the federal level, he simply asks for a level playing field that doesn't "act as if cities are un-American, but rather understands that the American Dream doesn't have to mean a white picket fence in the suburbs."

Cleveland’s major stakeholders are trying to reinvent the city after decades of decline and outmigration.  A New York Times article details their efforts in University Circle and the Uptown arts and entertainment district along the historic Euclid Avenue.   Uptown, which has received over $162 million in investments, aims to create a new downtown for the University Circle community which is within a one-mile radius of many of Cleveland’s most successful institutions.  Chris Ronayne, CEOs for Cities partner and president of University Circle Inc., said the area, which employs approximately 50,000 people, has “5,000 more jobs here than in 2005.”  In a city that had a population decline of 17 percent from 2000 to 2010, “The number of residents grew 11 percent since 2000. And there are 10,000 people who live here now,” cited Ronanyne. University Circle and projects similar to Uptown are the catalyst for Cleveland’s next generation.