Portland's Secrets to Success

From new Portland Mayor Sam Adams inaugural remarks:

What a glorious and quirky city we have.  Where else can you buy a donut designed to look like “dirt?”   Or browse one of the world’s largest bookstores and then walk a couple of blocks to the world’s smallest park. There is a reason experts always seem to rank us so
high. As the nation’s most livable city, the best city for seniors, the best city for walkers -- a city known for its bikers and hikers;
food and flowers; beer and bridges.

"The reason for all this is clear: That reason is you.  Us.  All of us. Because we have created this think-different, keep-it-real, improve-the-world kind of culture; a culture of sustainability, a culture you can’t find just anywhere else. It is the reason why Portland is a city we can love.  And it’s those values that position us to thrive at this moment of transition and transformation."

Mayor Adams announced "the city’s first local job creation and economic stimulus package.  I intend it to include scholarships so people recently laid off can get training at our Worksource Centers and community colleges.  Also, I want provisions in the stimulus package to give local companies – and companies that hire local workers – “buy local” preferences in awarded city contracts."

He also recognized the work CEOs for Cities and Joe Cortright did in Portland on the Green Dividend.  As he told his audience, "We can show what’s possible, setting an example the rest of the world can follow.  And we can prove sustainability pays off.  Our economy benefits from an estimated $2.6 billion annual green dividend. Portlanders get money back into their pockets through the automobile miles not driven, worse congestion not experienced and pollution not breathed.  Our green dividend grew from public
investments in transit and land-use planning. 

"Portland may be the greenest city in the country.  That’s no longer good enough.  We aim to be the greenest city on earth.    We can do this with thoughtful planning that integrates Portland’s value of sustainability into everything we do.  I want to see this philosophy
put into action with the completion of the Portland Plan, a blueprint for the next 30 years.
 
"The Portland Plan will put density where density belongs and shape our city so that the necessities of a good life, like grocery stores, are a 20-minute walk from home."

What if all mayors were thinking as ambitiously for their cities as Mayor Sam Adams? Wishing that it will be so...

  

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