Executive Director's Column

January 28, 2011
Washington, DC


Thanks to all the mayors who came to our Winter Meeting. Your leadership and participation continues to give the nation’s cities strength as we work with the Obama Administration and the new Congress.

As mayors left town, Washington awaited President Obama’s second State of the Union. Following the Tucson rampage and the national media frenzy over recent political rhetoric and lack of civility, many Republican and Democratic Senators and Congress members decided to sit together on the House floor. This development and somewhat basic act, that of Republican and Democratic members sitting down next to each other, got just about as much coverage as the President’s speech itself. You would’ve thought they had balanced the budget or passed the 1964 Civil Rights Bill.

Perhaps the President summed it up by recognizing the change in the seating of the night as he raised the question as to whether they would work together tomorrow. I had a flash back to 1961, The Shirelles song - Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? and the lyric line, “Is this a lasting treasure or just a moment’s pleasure? Can I believe the magic of your sighs? Will you still love me tomorrow?”

That’s the question before the American people today. Will the Congress work with the President? Will the President work with the Congress?

Immediately following the President’s address, there was not one Republican response; there were two. Right away, that didn’t seem to me like the American way. Two against one. But some might say it took two of them to respond to one of him. So the American public knows that one night of sitting together means nothing if when the night is over, or even before the night is over, the usual back and forth hardened rhetoric continues.

For over a year now during the many debates that have raged over other issues, it has been the mayors who have been pushing jobs, jobs, jobs, for our nation and our people. Conference President Kautz has not waivered. And at this Winter Meeting we had, due to her leadership and demand, the mayors and CEOs sitting together, working together, seeking answers to how business and mayors can work together to produce jobs to reduce the unacceptable high rates of unemployment across the nation.

We see the Washington players, the Congress and the President and the divisiveness. We have lived with it.

And then the nation comes to town. The nation, being the nation’s mayors, because the mayors are the nation, the nation of cities both large and small where the nation’s people live, work, and play, 24/7, 365 days a year. What a contrast to live in a divisive partisan political atmosphere of Washington, DC and then to experience a few days when the nation’s mayors come to town, working, debating with one thing in mind --- getting things done. Mayors get things done every day in their cities. They face unemployment, violence, illegal guns, immigration issues, traffic, recalls, challenged schools, homelessness, mental illness, poverty, pollution, and personal threats. Yet through it all they work on these issues because their electorate demands it and the mayors know it is expected of them.

America is and has been going through the worst economic times since the Great Depression. Some say we are coming out of it now. The people who don’t have a job didn’t get the news. Or as we say today, they didn’t get that email.

I said it at our Winter Meeting and I will state it here again. History will look back at what we went through and they will see what I have seen and what I see as we go through this time of depression and divisiveness. It is the nation’s mayors who have in their own way held this country together. They are there every day facing the media, facing the people and facing and helping the victims. They don’t fight with business; they work with business. When there is gun violence they talk about guns. They fight traffic and are blamed for it. They can’t run. They can’t hide.

This spirit of working together at the local level, which is devoid and bereft of any iota of partisanship, is part of their daily regimen and life. We saw it at this Winter Meeting of 2011. We marveled at it. It would’ve been good to have had the new Congress been given registration badges. It would have been good to have had them here mixing, mingling, learning not just how to sit together for one night but how it is for a group of elected leaders in America to work together to get things done for their government every day.

Some say today we are lucky to have this spirit of working in a bipartisan way within The United States Conference of Mayors. We are not lucky. Mayors work at it. We just accept our culture for what it is. And it’s always been that way. Today we, The United States Conference of Mayors are the last bastion of bipartisanship left in America. Washington leadership across the board could learn a lot of how it should be, to get things done by observing and hearing of how the mayors love their cities, like their cities, like their people and yes, love their people.

At this critical time when a new Congress and an adjusting President forms, once again we are reenergized or reaffirmed by the energy and spirit of the nation’s mayors assembled at our 2011 Winter Meeting. And with our mayoral leadership of President Elizabeth Kautz, Vice President Antonio Villaraigosa, and Second Vice President Michael Nutter we will bring the force of our bipartisan action to Congress and to the President to protect the interests of our people who live in cities large and small. It’s more than a one night sit. Morning comes, let’s love our country, let’s love our people and more than that, let’s quit fighting, and get things done.

The lyrics? So you don’t have to Google:
Tonight you're mine completely
You give your love so sweetly
Tonight the light of love is in your eyes
But will you love me tomorrow?

Is this a lasting treasure
Or just a moment's pleasure?
Can I believe the magic of your sighs?
Will you still love me tomorrow?

Tonight with words unspoken
You say that I'm the only one
But will my heart be broken
When the night meets the morning sun?

I'd like to know that your love
Is love I can be sure of
So tell me now, and I won't ask again
Will you still love me tomorrow?

So tell me now, and I won't ask again
Will you still love me tomorrow?


Let us hope that the Congress and the President will work together. And let us use our energy to set an example and push an agenda to force them toward a tomorrow that has civility, compassion, and love for our people. Thanks once more for coming to our 2011 Winter Meeting. Together, mayors will work to make a difference. It starts with a more civil nation. We started it here at our 2011 Winter Meeting as Tucson Mayor Bob Walkup brought us the first ever civility accord to sign. Let us continue as we go forward together for our cities and our nation.

Executive Director's Column

January 14, 2011

Washington, DC

Itís January 2011 and, once again, we welcome the nationís mayors to Washington for the 79th Winter Meeting.

New leaders have been elected in the House since the mid-term November elections. Committees are formed and soon the work begins.

President Obama and his economic team will soon send his 2011 budget proposals to Capitol Hill. The President proposes and Congress disposes.

At issue for us is the flagstone federal program since 1974, the HUD Community Development Block Grant program. Rumors and leaks from inside the Administration pointed to a proposed 25 percent cut in the CDBG program.

Calls involving mayors through the Christmas Holiday, on Christmas Eve and throughout the week leading up to New Years weekend continued expressing strong support for CDBG funding. Mayors continue to state that with the economic crunch we are experiencing, it is not the time to reduce the ongoing level of CDBG funds to cities throughout America.

We trust the voices of mayors and county officials supporting the CDBG program will be heard and that the Presidentís economic and political advisors will stand with President Obama who, at our 2008 Annual Meeting in Miami, said as a Presidential Candidate he supported "full funding of CDBG."

The New Congress

It is a bit early to tell where the new Congress is going to land as it deals with the CDBG program. Certainly, there is the air of the tea party to cut, cut, cut, cut and spend less.

It will be up to the mayors to protect this program. The Conference staff and our leadership will provide our mayors with the best economic and political arguments that CDBG should be fully funded. History shows that this block grant program has strong Republican support.

As a bipartisan group of elected officials, mayors must work on both sides of the aisles and up the middle of the aisle to protect this program. We can do it if we work together, and we will.

As we gather here in Washington this week, we will muster the support to return again in February and through the Spring to fight for this successful key priority, which is so needed during the economic downturn in so many cities.

We are appreciative of the way The National Association of Counties, The National League of Cities and The National Community Development Association have all come together as allies for this effort. The business community will be there giving support as they have been in the past. And together we will prevail.

Tucson Shooting - Arizona

Mayors from all over America and the globe have expressed their deepest sympathy and outrage over the senseless killings in Tucson. We applaud Tucson Mayor Walkup and Pima County Sheriff Dupnik for their leadership during this tragedy.

JFK 50th

Fifty years ago, he stood and made a speech that rings true today. He welcomed the challenges and he asked each of us to do something in our own way for our country. His daughter, Caroline, and I met early last year to keep his spirit and work alive. We are so proud and thankful to hundreds of mayors who have joined in the effort to go into our schools and ask our youth what they can do for our cities. Thank you Caroline Kennedy and thank you mayors for understanding and appreciating the force and living legacy of President John F. Kennedy our beloved 35th President.

2011 Congress - Action

Again, welcome to Washington for our 79th Winter Meeting and if I can be of any assistance to you while you are here and after you return home, please let me know. The coming weeks and months will present many challenges for key Conference of Mayors federal/city funded priorities. Working together, we will, as we have in the past, rise to the occasion and win. It is important that mayors and staff across America pay close attention to our calls to action as the Congress starts the appropriation and budgetary process. I look forward to working with you and Conference of Mayors President Elizabeth Kautz as we go forward.