To thrive, cities need a strategy

Spokane needs the young and the restless. Not the creaky TV soap opera, but those aged 25 to 44 who are footloose and free to go where they will. Capture them, and you have a city on its way to prosperity.

Lose them, and you’re nowheresville.

So says Carol Coletta, host of National Public Radio’s “Smart City” and a consultant with connections, seemingly, in City Halls throughout the U.S. Although based in Memphis, where she was a senior vice president for First Tennessee Bank, she also has a home in Chicago. That toddlin’ town is among those she admires for their spunk and innovation. Portland is another.

What have they got? Talent, for one. Leadership that thinks in terms of an entire metropolitan area, not just on one community’s parochial interests. And vision.

Chicago emerged from the shadows of New York City and Los Angeles by reinventing itself as a global metropolis attractive — although not cited by Coletta — to a company like Boeing. In order to get things done, mayors from throughout Chicagoland meet regularly to discuss the issues they can agree on.

Portland has thrived because it too is guided by a broad, inclusive leadership group, she said. The young and the restless are flocking in.

Coletta spoke Wednesday at the Spokane City Forum. Some of her comments were right on target, including warnings against imitation, and the too-often-voiced hostility to America’s urban areas, where by far the biggest share of the nation’s wealth is produced.

“Where is America without its cities?” she posed. “Well, it’s about 20 percent of America.”

Coletta noted that after decades of declining population, cities are growing. And many of those getting as close as possible to the action are the young, who make up one-third of those living within a three-mile radius of downtowns in 47 out of 50 of the largest cities in the U.S.

“If you’re going to grow your population of talented people, you’ve got to get them while they’re young,” she said.

And just having a university or two is not enough, a truism supporters of the University District have already grasped. Unless jobs or lifestyle or relationships connect graduates to the community, they will seep away and find those things elsewhere. Participants in 36 focus groups she conducted with young adults, Coletta said, wanted job opportunities, a chance to have their voices heard, and a sense of tolerance.

What are the drags on community growth? Racial isolation, for one. And wide income disparities. In fact, she says, the best measure of a city’s well-being is not population growth, but income growth.

She warned against imitation. Competitiveness is built on differences. If all cities try to be alike, “We lose our ability to compete on anything other than price,” Coletta says.

She mocked the idea of “best practices,” saying that they are probably outdated by the time they are recognized. Too often, leaders solve the problems behind them — a 9/11 or Katrina — and do not anticipate those ahead.

“We have had a failure of imagination,” she said.

Those aged 25 to 44 have the talent and the imagination to spark successful communities, she says, yet too many city fathers have their attention focused elsewhere: municipal officials focus on property owners, Chambers of Commerce on white businessmen, newspapers on elderly readers that comprise the bulk of their circulation base. (Ouch.)

Meanwhile, says Coletta, two-thirds of American cities are losing the very population they will need in the future. Many will never win them back. Without educated, engaged workers to replace retiring baby boomers, those cities face a bleak future.

“There may not be room for mid-performing cities,” she said. “You’d better get your strategy right, now.”

Spokane may not be there, yet, but the city has come a long way in the last five years or so. And it was good to get some validation last week from another source; the mayor of Macon, Georgia, a city of 100,000 about 75 miles south of Atlanta.

C. Jack Ellis, who spoke to the Sisters Cities International Conference here in July, has been around the world with the military, as well as an emissary for the United Nations. He was so impressed by the city’s parks, medical resources and other assets, he returned with other city officials to learn more about how the community works.

Were he to leave Macon, Spokane and Cape Town, South Africa, would top his relocation choices, Ellis said.

Spokane. Near Nature. Near Perfect. When you don’t have Georgia on your mind.

You can hear a rebroadcast of Coletta’s remarks on KSFC-FM, 91.0, at 6 p.m. tonight(Sunday).