The Citistates Group

The Citistates Group is led by America’s only journalist team focused first and foremost on metropolitan regions and how they position themselves to cope with the demanding economic, environmental, social challenges of the 21st century.

Neal Peirce and Curtis Johnson have written Citistates Reports on strategic issue sets facing 24 metropolitan regions, published by over 50 newspapers in the last 20 years. Recently they wrote a series on critical issues facing an entire six-state region -- New England.

The Citistates Group includes a collegial network of Associates with parallel interests — and achievements. Many are public speakers and authors of cutting-edge research and writing in the field.

Activities of the Group — a “virtual” corporation without established offices or staff — are managed by Farley Peters, the group’s organizer and strategist.

Peirce Receiving Scroll of Honor Award

No sooner was Citistates Group Chairman Neal Peirce awarded the prestigious UN-Habitat Scroll of Honour at the World Habitat Day celebrations in Washington, D.C., in early October, than he was off to Barcelona to participate as a steering committee member of UN Habitat’s World Urban Campaign focused on sustainable urbanization.

En route, Peirce prepared his column on the importance of the United Nations World Habitat Day that had been held for the first time in the United States, noting both the event and the disturbing lack of U.S. media coverage. Arriving in Barcelona, he also toured the inventive 22@Barcelona project, a world-leading neighborhood revival project, interviewing the leader of the effort for his next column.

If that wasn’t enough, Neal along with Citistates colleague Farley Peters, networked with participants at the World Urban Campaign steering committee meeting to gauge interest in a new journalism project focused on desperately needed innovations and breakthroughs in cities across the world.

With the strong interest and support of Nicholas You at UN-Habitat, Kevin Milroy of Cities Alliance, Gary Lawrence (the ex-Seattle planning director now a senior executive with Arup), Gordon Feller of the Urban Age Institute and others, the Citistates Group is now moving forward to develop a business plan for the journalism project.

The World Urban Campaign’s major goal is a series of consciousness-raising steps to “elevate the importance accorded to sustainable urbanization in global, national and local policy and decision making,” looking forward to the Fifth World Urban Forum, focused on “The Right to the City- Bridging the Urban Divide,” scheduled to take place in Rio de Janeiro, March 22-26, 2010.

Too often, there’s a big split — We discuss urban futures in an exclusively U.S. context. Debates about city futures around the rest of the world occur broadly outside the United States, but not here. But look for a big exception in World Habitat Day for 2009, scheduled for October 5 in Washington with a rich melange of related activities spread over an entire week. The contrasts but also parallels between UN-Habitat’s strong focus on developing world cities and a new era of urban policy in America are likely to be the object of unusually focused discussions.

The major World Habitat Day opening ceremony will feature UN-Habitat Executive Director Anna Tibaijuka, but also Rockefeller Foundation president Judith Rodin and top-level Obama administration officials including Melody Barnes, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council and HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan. “President Obama,” Donovan notes, “has asked that we become engaged in the global discussion on our shared vision of making socially and environmentally sustainable urban communities.”

Ron Sims

In a separate October 5 event, at Howard University, the topic will be “Livable Communities” including White House Office of Urban Affairs Director Adolfo Carrion, HUD Deputy Secretary Ron Sims, Tibaijuka, and Deputy Washington, D.C. Mayor Valerie Santos Young.

On October 6, the Brookings Institution’s Metropolitan Policy Program, in coordination with the Rockefeller Foundation, will host a major public discussion on creating sustainable global cities including metropolitan models for managing climate change. Participants will include Brookings’ Bruce Katz, Darren Walker (vice president for foundation initiatives for Rockefeller), Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels (president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors), and New York City Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan, joined by international metropolitan leaders.

On October 7, the International Housing Coalition (with support from the Aspen Institute and Habitat for Humanity), will host a major discussion on “Urbanization, Slums and U.S. Foreign Assistance.” And on October 8, there’ll be a major discussion on “Bridging the Urban Divide”, hosted by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars with assistance from the Rockefeller Foundation and CHF International. It’s advertised a start to a series on “The Road to Rio” — UN Habitat’s World Urban Forum 5 in Rio de Janeiro in March 2010.

Other Habitat Day events — one might well say “Habitat Week” events — include forums sponsored by the Urban Land Institute, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Virginia Polytechnic Institute, the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning, the American Planning Association, and Grassroots Women and Affordable Housing.

The overall theme of the Habitat events – “Planning Our Urban Future” – is intended to raise awareness of the need to improve urban planning to help the world’s cities deal with the major challenges the economic crisis, climate disruption, and alarming levels of urban poverty around the world.

Related – Peirce Among Scroll of Honour Awardees

Scroll of Honour award

Neal Peirce

Citistates chair Neal Peirce will be among the 11 organizations and individuals from around the world to receive UN Habitat’s Scroll of Honour Award — “considered the most significant prize in the field of human settlements” –at the October 5 event. His citation: “For a lifetime of journalism dedicated to reporting on cities for a better urban future.”

Citiwire.net column — July 24, 2009

“John Parr was an uncommon American citizen.” Those were the words of that my fellow Alliance for Regional Stewardship board member and Citistates colleague, Doug Henton of Collaborative Economics, on the untimely passing of John Parr, a great, boundary-crossing national civic leader. John and his wife Sandy and daughter Chase tragically died in an auto accident in December 2007.

Parr’s lifetime mission was to recognize and motivate others in the arts of community building. He was one of America’s foremost counselors in the area of collaborative government, public/private partnerships, and regional governance. In that tradition, the Alliance for Regional Stewardship, which I am chairing this year, is pleased to announce the John Parr Award, to be bestowed annually by the Alliance for outstanding personal leadership and excellence in advancing regionalism and civic stewardship of metropolitan areas. John himself embodied that ideal through many activities, including his decades of inspirational and practical leadership of the Denver region and his contributions as a co-founder of the Alliance for Regional Stewardship.Your browser may not support display of this image.

John Parr

It is fitting that the inaugural John Parr Award is being presented to Neal Peirce and his Citistates Group co-founders Curt Johnson and Farley Peters. Neal, Curt and Farley shared a lifetime of civic collaboration with John Parr–through the Citistates Group, the National Civic League, and the Alliance for Regional Stewardship. Neal helped recruit John for the National Civic League presidency; John advised the Citistates team on their first “Peirce Report” (for the Phoenix region in 1987); Curtis worked closely with John on many projects including the Boundary Crossers project and book with the late John Gardner; and Farley sparked organization of the Citistates Group in 1995, with John as a charter Associate and speaker.

The John Parr Award will be made annually to recognize individuals who have dedicated their work and personal service, as well as social and political capital, to regional stewardship. The Award named in his honor is the only recognition that the Alliance bestows upon individuals. It was formally presented to Neal, Curt and Farley at the Alliance’s Annual Meeting and Regional Strategies Forum on Wednesday, July 29th in Raleigh, North Carolina.

The John Parr Award recognizes Neal Peirce as one of the most widely-recognized and widely-read writers in the nation about metropolitan regions–their political and economic dynamics, and their emerging national and global roles. His weekly column, syndicated through the Washington Post Writers Group since 1978, appears in over 50 newspapers. Time magazine has called Neal “the only national chronicler of grass-roots America.”

Sharing credit for accomplishments and humility are hallmarks of effective regional stewardship, yet no one can deny the role that individual leaders play in successful regional initiatives and advancing the civic stewardship of regions. Through their over 25 years of producing independent civic diagnostics of over 25 regions, Neal, Curt and Farley have had transformational impacts on the livability and economic competitiveness of regions throughout America.

In our own bi-state St. Louis region, a 1997 Peirce Report published in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch proved to be a civic wakeup call for St. Louis, generating unified region-wide action which has stimulated some $5 billion in reinvestment in the region’s center city and launching the region as the BioBelt: The Center of Plant & Medical Sciences.

Citistates co-founders Neal Peirce, Farley Peters, and Curtis Johnson.

Neal, Curt, and Farley established the Citistates Group in 1995 with the goal of bringing an array of public policy, regional and economic development expertise together in a collaborative group that could be accessible to people trying to solve regional and community problems anywhere in the country. Since then, the Citistates Group has emerged as a nationally-recognized network of journalists, speakers, community and economic developers and advisers committed to competitive, equitable, and sustainable metropolitan regions. Their trademark “Citistates Reports” (formerly “Peirce Reports”) — independent assessments of a particular region’s major problems and opportunities — have been catalysts for change in metropolitan areas regions across the country. Their most recent book, Century of the City — No Time To Lose–reflects their experience covering the Bellagio Global Urban Summit sponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation during the summer of 2007.