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What role are public-private partnerships going to have in funding development in cities? Is that just happy talk or is there reality to it? Hsu-Chen: It’s very real talk. And we’re getting smarter and better at it. Right now a lot of the incentives the city offers are around getting the right density at transit nodes. Kate and I worked together on a project just a couple years ago—Kate in the private sector, I in the public—to deliver a new state-of-the-art skyscraper right across the street from Pennsylvania Station.

The world has become increasingly urban—more than 50 percent of the globe’s population now live in cities. How can we make them more sustainable, efficient, and prosperous?

We don’t have a strong central government. We have a federal system.

The experiment found that on an apples-to-apples basis, posting local content drove stronger levels of shares, likes and comments than global content. 

We found that during the first four months of this experiment, the average engagement rate across all geo-focused posts was six times higher than all global posts.

They identified nine different types of story that drove higher levels of engagement as shown in this infographic.  

local and city governments play an increasingly influential role.

‘A ‘local developmental state’ model appears to have emerged in many of the most successful countries and regions, most notably in post-war northern Italy, Southern Germany and in several Scandinavian countries…. The core idea is that sub-national levels of government can, and should, be pro-active in building the institutional and organisational infrastructures required for growth-ori¬ented micro-, small and medium enterprises to emerge and succeed.’

They are also at a scale where it is much easier for relatively small organizations to engage at the city level

connected to many other movements - like new urbanism, slow city, slow food, and eco-cities.

it is genuine engagement and connectedness with individual community members - to a point where they themselves become place-makers of their own making.

It is about creating a culture of participatory and grassroots democracy where the community has direct ownership of the processes and outcomes. This is a huge difference from our current engagement and planning framework, which does the opposite.

What role are public-private partnerships going to have in funding development in cities? Is that just happy talk or is there reality to it? Hsu-Chen: It’s very real talk. And we’re getting smarter and better at it. Right now a lot of the incentives the city offers are around getting the right density at transit nodes. Kate and I worked together on a project just a couple years ago—Kate in the private sector, I in the public—to deliver a new state-of-the-art skyscraper right across the street from Pennsylvania Station.

In Europe you have a strong central government that can come in and work with the private sector to deliver something locally. Here it’s up to the municipalities to figure out how to use those public-private partnerships at the local level to deliver the types of benefits that Edith was talking about.

We think a lot of great real relationships are being built through the platform, something that we always hoped would happen, and now we’re actually seeing it happen.

You get to choose directly where your money goes.

I think other people are starting to have the same feeling that they want to have more autonomy about their community or about the businesses they support or just about most things.

The CRA was created in 1977 and mandates that banks make credit and capital available to low- and moderate-income communities.

Launched in 1999, the Fund’s CRA Shares are designed specifically for banks looking to receive positive consideration on the investment test portion of their CRA exam. Once a bank makes an investment in the CRA Shares, the Advisor confirms its targeted assessment area(s) and begins seeking CRA-qualified investments in those counties. From a financial standpoint, each bank owns a pro-rata share of the Fund whereby the risks and returns are diversified among all the shareholders. The Fund invests primarily in government-related subsectors of the bond market that support community development such as agency-backed securities and taxable municipal bonds.

The CRA Qualified Investment Fund CRA Shares has provided solid performance throughout its history.

To date, however, the industry has yet todevelop standards to evaluate ESG datathat compare to its traditional evaluation o portolio perormance.

  5 Responsible Property Investment [RPI] is anemerging investment strategy and disciplineconcerned with integrating environmental,social, and governance [ESG] data intoinvestment decision-making

Real estate investment plays a undamentalrole in determining how society usesresources, how the built environmentshapes social lie, how economic activitycan be sustainable over time. As an assetclass, real estate oers especially tangibledemonstrations o the importance o ESGanalysis in creating value or investors andsociety alike. We believe that a robustmetrics system can help shape the marketto better create sustainable outcomes or allstakeholders

There’s a new era of social networking that’s taking shape around charitable giving. Younger people are rapidly adopting these new tools, and learning to use them in more and more substantive ways, to go beyond mere socializing and make these tools extremely productive. We’re seeing the sphere of social networking mature in a way that’s very exciting. People who continue to dismiss these social platforms as "a waste of time" or "just social chatter" are missing the boat. This is how people interact with each other and get things done. They share their personal and professional lives online. It should be no different when it comes to their philanthropic lives. More and more, we’re seeing the Crowdrise community share their charitable efforts with their social networks, both as a way to highlight their own commitment to a cause and as a very efficient way to turn their friends and family into new supporters.

They say “time is money,” but time is also an irreplaceable and personal connection to a cause.

“We cannot apply the same approach for both.”

As UTC’s Sisson put it, “When we see cities stepping up and making policies and strategies in support of energy efficiency, that is a clear signal to us.” He also pointed out that city visions can vary dramatically, so it’s important to understand their objectives.

People are fundamentally resistant to change, argue Chip and Dan Heath in Switch, but there are ways to make positive behavior easier and more likely. One method: shrink the change. It’s easier for people to take a small step like washing the dishes than a large step like cleaning the whole apartment. But once they take that small step and reap the rewards, they’re more likely to continue and expand on that initial behavior.

We’ve already been blown away by the excitement and energy exhibited on campuses across the world. More than 1,100 students are taking actions like riding their bikes instead of driving, getting a dose of inspiration from a Ted Talk, and volunteering with a local nonprofit. They are competing against each other for prizes big and small. The competition feeds the program’s growth, expanding the impact of each small step,

It is composed of scientists and engineers, university professors, poets and architects, and also includes "people in design, education, arts, music and entertainment, whose economic function is to create new ideas, new technology and/or creative content”

Employers see creativity as a channel for self-expression and job satisfaction in their employees. About 38.3 million Americans and 30 percent of the American workforce identify themselves with the Creative Class.

cities which attract and retain creative residents prosper, while those that do not stagnate. This research has gained traction in the business community, as well as among politicians and urban planners. Florida and other Creative Class theorists have been invited to meetings of the National Conference of Mayors and numerous economic development committees, such the Denver mayor's Task Force on Creative Spaces and Michigan governor Jennifer Granholm's Cool Cities Initiative.[1]

11 key elements in transforming public spaces into vibrant community places,

identify the talents and assets within the community.

will help to create a sense of community ownership in the project that can be of great benefit to both the project sponsor and the community.

To put public space at the heart of public discourse where it belongs

tying culture change to economics

“We can shift the paradigm of how we build our cities; thinking about economics is a great way to do that because it cuts through the political divide.”