Two days after the Presidential election, CEOs for Cities will convene in Chicago for a special one-day meeting to challenge the President-elect and his transition team to establish a new era of cooperation between the Federal government and America's cities.

At a national press conference during the Nov. 6 meeting, our network of urban leaders will commit itself to innovative bottom-up initiatives and will ask a fresh-start Administration to meet us halfway in a collaborative working relationship to make the best of difficult times.

Representing the nation’s primary source of wealth, employment and global competitiveness, urban leaders will ask for a new attitude from the federal government – an attitude of encouragement and support for nation-building at the grassroots. For its part, CEOs for Cities will roll out at this special session three strategies the organization has derived from years of research into how to grow and to green urban economies.

The three strategies will be detailed at the members-only meeting and later to the press. CEOs' Talent Dividend, Green Dividend, and Core Vitality Dividend show projected urban gross regional product growth – in dollar terms – from progressive improvement in clearly defined areas of human capital development, environmental improvement, and core-city revitalization. This alone makes it a must-attend meeting.

In an era of fiscal constraint at every level of government, CEOs for Cities intends to show two days after election day that its unique membership of city mayors, urban university presidents, business leaders, and city-based philanthropists is a creative problem-solving force that has innovated practical economy-building – and people-building – initiatives worthy of the federal government’s attention and respect.

On Thursday, Nov. 6 we'll convene promptly at 8:30 a.m. with agenda-setting conversations through 3:30 p.m. Plan to join us for a special evening event to kick off the meeting on Wednesday, Nov. 5, from 7 to 9:30 p.m. If you can stay an extra day, we have small group meetings on current and future initiatives, including the Creative Cities Network, Friday morning that will wrap up by 1 p.m.

The full agenda will be available in the coming weeks.

For more information, contact Bridget Marquis at bmarquis@ceosforcities.org.

There are no comments for this entry.

Post a Comment

*Name:

E-mail Address:

URL:

*Comment:

Please type this word:

*required fields. your email address will not be published

Please leave the following field blank: