Who Can Solve London's Great Challenges? | Planetizen

Against the backdrop of a made-for-tv mayoral election, Richard Florida looks at the litany of issues afflicting London as the city struggles with the deepest challenges it has faced since the Great Depression and post-war years.

As Ken Livingstone, the former mayor and “fiery socialist with a penchant for dropping explosive sound bites”, faces off against Boris Johnson, “the tousled-haired, bike-riding conservative incumbent”, in an election run-up resembling “a reality TV show,” the reality of the pressing challenges facing the city could make for some rather dramatic television themselves.

“The city has been buffeted by the financial crisis, suffering more severe blows than most cities, from which it is still suffering.” With the city’s economic, media, and entertainment power weakening, and forecasted to decline further, “the next mayor will have to spearhead a plan to stave off growing competition from a host of global cities.”

Florida describes a laundry list of additional challenges that the city’s next mayor will have to address: from bolstering its high-tech economy to better connecting its educational institutions to the private sector and bridging the growing class divide.

“Whether Boris or Ken, London’s next mayor is going to have to thread this needle — to make the city even more attractive to global talent and business while at the same time improving its livability and affordability for ordinary people. It’s a daunting challenge — one that the city’s future prosperity turns on.”

Full Story: London’s Next Top Mayor

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“Why the Federal Government Should Give More Power to Mayors Sarah Goodyear. April 18. 2012 “We’re being strangled by the lack of action at the federal level. That’s why mayors are where the action is.” Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed uttered these words during a panel discussion titled “Cities 2012: Are Cities the New Global Building Blocks?” at the New York Ideas forum Tuesday, co-presented by The Atlantic, the Aspen Institute, and the New-York Historical Society. Reed and his fellow panelists, Houston Mayor Annise Parker and New York Deputy Mayor Robert Steel, talked a lot aboutthe new report from the McKinsey Global Institute, which shows that 259 of the largest cities in the United States are responsible for 10 percent of global GDP. That economic significance, they argued, means that American cities merit way more clout than they get in the current political environment. The mayors talked about the multitude of challenges facing American cities today – unemployment, pension and health care costs, outdated infrastructure, education, social inequity. All three emphasized that municipal government is more accountable, more innovative, and more responsive than federal government. “I hope for the good of the country, cities continue to lead on these issues,” said Reed, whose hard-nosed pension reform deal attracted national attention last year. “Because if we wait for the federal government to move on issues like immigration and real job creation, then I think we’re going to be waiting for some time.” Reed pointed out that a huge proportion of the nation’s GDP is generated in cities, but that mayors still have a hard time getting the feds to pump money back into them. “If you look at the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, less than 10 percent of those dollars went into cities, where 80 percent of GDP occurs,” he said. “We’re going to have to shift national politics, and we’re going to have to shift state politics. Governors have a better lobby than mayors do. That’s why they got 90 percent of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, when that money should have gone to cities. Because we deploy it faster, we’re more creative, and we’re more representative of the majority of the United States of America.” Via: The Atlantic Cities Photo: Elena Olivo via massurban:

“Why the Federal Government Should Give More Power to Mayors

Sarah Goodyear. April 18. 2012

“We’re being strangled by the lack of action at the federal level. That’s why mayors are where the action is.”

Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed uttered these words during a panel discussion titled “Cities 2012: Are Cities the New Global Building Blocks?” at the New York Ideas forum Tuesday, co-presented by The Atlantic, the Aspen Institute, and the New-York Historical Society.

Reed and his fellow panelists, Houston Mayor Annise Parker and New York Deputy Mayor Robert Steel, talked a lot aboutthe new report from the McKinsey Global Institute, which shows that 259 of the largest cities in the United States are responsible for 10 percent of global GDP. That economic significance, they argued, means that American cities merit way more clout than they get in the current political environment.

The mayors talked about the multitude of challenges facing American cities today – unemployment, pension and health care costs, outdated infrastructure, education, social inequity. All three emphasized that municipal government is more accountable, more innovative, and more responsive than federal government.

“I hope for the good of the country, cities continue to lead on these issues,” said Reed, whose hard-nosed pension reform deal attracted national attention last year. “Because if we wait for the federal government to move on issues like immigration and real job creation, then I think we’re going to be waiting for some time.”

Reed pointed out that a huge proportion of the nation’s GDP is generated in cities, but that mayors still have a hard time getting the feds to pump money back into them. “If you look at the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, less than 10 percent of those dollars went into cities, where 80 percent of GDP occurs,” he said. “We’re going to have to shift national politics, and we’re going to have to shift state politics. Governors have a better lobby than mayors do. That’s why they got 90 percent of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, when that money should have gone to cities. Because we deploy it faster, we’re more creative, and we’re more representative of the majority of the United States of America.”

Via: The Atlantic Cities

Photo: Elena Olivo

via massurban:

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