Special Edition! New Partners Conference Partnerships Spark Smart Growth Successes
Local leaders are uniquely positioned to improve the livability of communities. Closer to the problems, you can test innovative solutions for sparking economic growth, improving quality of life and protecting the environment – which also makes you pioneers for state and national change. That said, many issues cross disciplines and jurisdictional boundaries making partnerships critical to addressing key smart growth issues such as public safety, social equity, access to healthy food and active living opportunities and climate change.
“The challenges of the 21st century will require an unprecedented level of collaboration and innovation,” the Local Government Commission’s executive director Kate Meis told a crowd of more than 1,200 attendees earlier this month in Denver at the 13th annual New Partners for Smart Growth conference. “This includes working with state and federal partners and working together across disciplines to create communities that are resilient, prosperous and equitable.”
Forming effective, new partnerships – and invigorating established ones – can provide the political will and technical expertise to overcome inertia and change “business as usual.”
Each year, our National New Partners for Smart Growth conference brings together people from across the country with multiple disciplines to discover new partners and to learn from innovative responses to pressing issues, selected from impressive initiatives drawn from throughout the country.
Looking across the nation, we can see that the hard work being done in places big and small by local, regional, state and federal partnerships is making a difference – and creating successful models for other communities to follow.
This newsletter highlights some of the innovative local programs we showcased in Denver, focusing on new partnerships, tools and strategies – hope they inspire you the way they did us!
