Smarter Cities and Community Engagement

As a follow-up to Monday’s post, the two top finishers in the Chicago mayoral election were Lori Lightfoot and Toni Preckwinkle. They will meet in an April runoff.

During the election I was down in Miami speaking at the Knight Foundation’s annual Media Forum. I was honored to be invited to participate and was on a panel devoted to smarter cities. Here’s the video of our session. If the video player doesn’t display for you, click over to watch on You Tube.

from Aaron M. Renn
https://www.aaronrenn.com/2019/02/28/smarter-cities-and-community-engagement/

A Mad Dash for City Hall in the Windy City

If you didn’t see it in the weekend paper, my latest piece is now online in the Wall Street Journal. It’s about the Chicago mayoral election and the state of the city. Here’s an excerpt:

Visitors to Chicago’s gleaming downtown might never know that the Windy City faces a fiscal crisis driven by unfunded pension liabilities as well as major challenges with crime and corruption. But local voters should know the full story as they head to the polls Tuesday to pick a new mayor.

Thirteen candidates—mostly Democrats—are vying to replace Mayor Rahm Emanuel, whose eight years in office have been dogged by controversies including a major teachers strike and allegations of police brutality. His unexpected decision not to run for re-election created a wide-open field to replace him.
…
The backdrop of Tuesday’s election is a strange mixture of urban glitter, violent crime and woeful governance. Chicago has proved itself different from other postindustrial American cities. It has a strong economic base and continues to draw talent and investment. The Windy City’s potential is unlimited if it gets its act together. But doing so will require fresh thinking and a real commitment to reform—qualities noticeably missing among the city’s permanent political class and the baker’s dozen of candidates vying to be the next mayor.

Click through to read the whole thing.

Cover image credit: Diego Delso, CC BY-SA 3.0

from Aaron M. Renn
https://www.aaronrenn.com/2019/02/25/a-mad-dash-for-city-hall-in-the-windy-city/

Don’t Fall in the Branding Trap

My latest piece is online in City Lab. It’s another look at urban branding. Here’s an excerpt.

The problem with the typical approach extends beyond just marketing. It has tangible consequences. A brand is really a city’s conception of itself. By selling itself as a facsimile of something its not, a city ends up turning that into reality. Thus, so many urban places today seem vaguely the same—a blur of Edison-bulbed eateries and mid-rise “one plus five” apartment buildings (in which up to five stories of wood frame construction are built atop a concrete first floor). These buildings, which all look vaguely the same with their multi-shaded exterior panels that seem destined to date quickly, are now obligatory elements in densifying urban neighborhoods, as critics have observed,

In a much-discussed New York magazine essay, Oriana Schwindt dubbed this “the unbearable sameness of cities.” Traveling to the city nearest the geographic center of each state, she described how she constantly kept seeing the same Ikea lights in coffee shops she’d visit. “And it wasn’t just the coffee shops—bars, restaurants, even the architecture of all the new housing going up in these cities looked and felt eerily familiar. Every time I walked into one of these places, my body would give an involuntary shudder. I would read over my notes for a city I’d visited months prior and find that several of my observations could apply easily to the one I was currently in.”

She’s not the only one who’s noticed that urban neighborhoods seem to be built from the same box of standard components: Vox recently explored the ubiquity of “the metal chair that’s in every restaurant.”

There are always fads and trends, of course. We all take part in at least some of them, and having fun doing so is part of what it means to be human. (I, for one, am happy that so many American cities now have a “barbecue place with lacquered-wooden tables” that Schwindt noted.) But there’s a thin line between fashionable and fashion victim. Cities need to sell something more than just the trends.

Click through to read the whole thing.

from Aaron M. Renn
https://www.aaronrenn.com/2019/02/14/dont-fall-in-the-branding-trap/

President Pete?

Photo Credit: Edward Kimmel, CC BY-SA 2.0

My latest piece is online at City Journal. It’s a look at the improbable presidential candidacy of South Bend, Indiana mayor Pete Buttigieg. Some excerpts:

Buttigieg has the impressive résumé one would expect from an aspiring presidential candidate. Born in South Bend, he was valedictorian of his high school, then went to Harvard and received a Rhodes Scholarship. He became a Naval Reserve officer and served in Afghanistan as an intelligence officer. He’s worked in elite business and Democratic political circles, doing a stint at McKinsey and Company and on John Kerry’s presidential campaign.

Mayor of South Bend is an odd platform from which to pursue the presidency. Being a mayor of any sort is typically a dead-end job. Only three presidents have ever served as mayor, the last being Calvin Coolidge. Perhaps because of resentment against big cities, mayors aren’t often elected governor of their states, either. The Washington Post observed that making that leap is “rare.” Cory Booker’s rise from celebrity mayor of Newark to the U.S. Senate perhaps inspired others to see City Hall as a stepping stone to greater things, but it remains an atypical trajectory.

For Democrat Buttigieg, running for mayor may have reflected limited political options. Indiana is solid red, with Republicans dominating the state since the election of Mitch Daniels as governor in 2004. Buttigieg tried running for state treasurer in 2010 but was crushed by Republican Richard Mourdock, getting only 37.5 percent of the vote. Though being gay may seem like a negative in socially conservative Indiana, the real scarlet letter for Buttigieg is the “D” after his name.

Click through to read the whole thing.

 

from Aaron M. Renn
https://www.aaronrenn.com/2019/02/07/president-pete/