Newsletters

In the final chapter of The New Localism, we recommended that each city and metropolis needed to ask the simple question “What’s Your City’s Edge?” as part of pursuing a growth strategy with inclusive, innovative and sustainable outcomes. This question appeals directly to the rising demand for data — and evidence-driven decision-making among constituencies that lead urban economic development. It is also a central question for those concerned with social mobility and neighborhood investment.

Our friends at Centre for Cities in London recently hosted a New Localism event at The Shard, Renzo Piano’s inspiring and imposing skyscraper on the south bank of the Thames. Being London, nothing was visible from the upper floors of the building given rain and fog on the evening of our gathering. But the discussion was illuminating nonetheless, which you can listen to here —www.centreforcities.org/multimedia/event-catch-city-horizons-bruce-katz-cities-age-populism/.

At its core, The New Localism is a book about the rise of networks and networked governance as vehicles for problem solving. As we state in the Introduction:

The current suite of supersized economic, social and environmental challenges and the abdication of responsibilities by the federal government and many states demand new models of local governance. The most effective local governance occurs in places that not only deploy the formal and informal powers of government but create and steward new multi-sector networks to advance inclusive, sustainable and innovative growth. The logic is incontrovertible: if cities are networks of institutions and leaders, then institutions and leaders should co-govern cities. (emphasis added)

Over the past two months, we have visited 12 U.S. cities and counties as part of our New Localism book tour and met with public, private and civic leaders from dozens more.

In city after city, our discussions have quickly turned from a general synopsis of the themes and recommendations of the book to a specific discussion of a little-known tax incentive contained in the recently enacted Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 that focuses on attracting private investment to distressed communities. Given the emphasis in our book on the importance of organizing civic and private capital, this was not unexpected.