Getting to know each one of them was the event is called a new generation of mayors and citys, we have mayors all in their first term in the case of mayor lincoln only four weeks on the job, mayors doing interesting things, interesting ideas about the future, very challenging times, the pandemic, urban unrest and a bunch of other challenges that flow from those things. I want to dive right in and hear about what they are doing and what it means for Public Policy and the future of our cities, mayor of Miami Francis suarez was elected in 2013, first term mayors, district number 4, the first miami born mayor of the city. Look forward to hearing from you, Francis Suarez. David holt, mayor of Oklahoma City since 2013, the first native american mayor of Oklahoma City and one of the youngest mayors of the city with 500,000 residents that he served eight years in the senate in oklahoma. The newest member of the bench, Kevin Lincoln just assumed office which the Census Bureau calls the most diverse city in america, four weeks ago, january of 2021. Previously served in the marine corps and during that time was assigned to marine one during the george w. Bush 10 year, worked for the community of stockton in a fulltime ministry. In our cities, look forward to diving right in. It would be great to hear a little bit about why you ran in the first place, what got you interested in this job and you can address that in due course when you have a chance but i thought i would start with you, Francis Suarez, something will take you from a set to 30 so hope we get to you first, and deal with questions after the fact, even after he leaves and get back to you but i want to start with you, talk a little bit about what it is like to pursue a dynamism agenda in the middle of a pandemic. Take advantage of that, you made noise in december by on twitter you invited Silicon Valley to miami and it resulted in a lot of activity. Seems you were taking advantage of the fact that people were pretty mobile, looking at places that have gotten expensive and new alternatives. I want to hear about that because we are used to news about the pandemic so seems you are utilizing the situation to pursue some goals you had for miami anyway. Tell us what you were doing there. Thank you for the opportunity to share the stage with two friends, a recently elected new friends, the college of mayors. As you said, the Technology Ecosystem is something the city of miami, this is a startup that received its first infusion of Venture Capital ponds so that moment, what if we made miami, no words, how can i help . The reason why there is a confluence of factors that come together. Tax policy is a major issue, that is understated, be welcome, be receptive, treating people with dignity, people are creators, innovators, their job and their rule is to build companies that in many cases changed the way we live and the decisions we make and do it better, they are not necessarily required to cure societys bills. They are not responsible for all the things that are wrong in the city so from my perspective, they take a hospitality approach making sure people feel welcome in our city. The issue of my generation is income inequality. It is difficult to deal with income inequality if you dont create jobs. That is one of the essential tenets to try to create upward mobility and then create is close to an educational equal Playing Field to make sure the children of your community no matter where they are born or what their station in life as an opportunity to occupy one of those jobs. That is a secondary challenge. I think people are first looks like we might have lost Francis Suarez as he is mobile. On the move. He has frozen up. We will rejoin and come back to him when we can. David holt, i wonder if you could pick up on some of this. I want to talk a little bit about what you experienced in Oklahoma City in terms of protests from last summer because you pursued that in a very intentional way but before we talk about that can you talk a little bit about what you have been doing to create the kind of dynamism in Oklahoma City that the city has been known for because like miami where Francis Suarez has been expensing that is experiencing quite a lot of groove lately, both cities will above the National Average. Tell us what it has been like to pursue a dynamism agenda to attract good paying jobs, to grow the city during a time of crisis. Thank you for the invitation, appreciate your organization very much and like Francis Suarez, it is honor to be on the panel with he and mayor lincoln. In Oklahoma City i inherited great momentum. Our teams success was well documented in Oklahoma City and often other places as well. We started investing in ourselves, passing these temporary sales taxes to build qualityoflife initiatives, not necessarily Core Infrastructure, mechanisms for that in play but we found 25 years ago that it was important to have a lot of free market principles in place that you preach but if nobody wants to live there, they are not going to be as interested in your Workers Compensation policy or income tax rate, we find ourselves in that box in the early 90s so we started building stuff and call it maps and we still do, one person temporary sales tax that are voters of approved four times and when i took office we were in the final stages and i championed for my first two years the creation and adoption by the voters maps 4 and that happened three months before the commencement of the pandemic and it is a qualityoflife project and so many things to go into a successful and dynamic city but i find if the city is investing in itself actively and in a wellknown way, not only does investments, it encourages everybody, this is a place that is dynamic, where things are happening. 1 billion rollout over the next decade, when things that gives me hope beyond the pandemic, dont mean to run it in my colleagues faces but i wish they had a billiondollar stimulus package the voters improve 3 months before the start of the pandemic, a great thing to look forward to and it will be a great aid to us as we look forward and completely recover and go beyond where we were before. What kinds of things more specifically has the investment gone for or what will it do . We have done some work here in the last couple years based on the survey and found there is a strong relationship between quality life and the things that matter, the Grocery Store let alone the restaurant and those things they are close to, they find that correlation, people talk to their neighbors more frequently, something about being out and about loosens you up and the kinds of things, the way the environment is constructed, more than we realize, im curious to know what sorts of things you are investing in. Your comments are right on point with some of our projects in the past. It made possible the arena, and the Meeting Place for the community. We never came together as a Community Like that. A 70 acre urban park in the core of downtown, a place that brings people to get their, has 16 projects for 1 billion, everybody wants one now. Weve got youth centers, a 20 million type youth center, and these are human things and neighborhood things, it needed to happen. We had a dying downtown that we had to look at but i suggest most people here locally, most people would say it is focused on neighborhoods and the needs of our citizens, we did the downtown stuff, now we need to look back in daily lives, how could we as a city invest in their happiness . We cant do it all but there are a lot of things people will take responsibility for themselves but Core Infrastructure needs, will not be estate for that thing. They vote with their feet. If they want to live in a city, there will be entrepreneurs, we feel we have grown in population. In pretty good shape after the pandemic. They have different backgrounds. What we are talking about the best part. One thing i want to follow up on, you have been experiencing a 9 population growth, considerable Household Income growth when we lost you. How are we keeping supply and demand up in Silicon Valley what you are dealing with is dont have that dynamic. What we see is these Large Centers of commerce, people cant afford to live there, the question is close to the office, you capitalize on that but miami is a been town but you are managing to thread the needle differently with high cost centers. It allows us to grow in terms of physical asking to connect so we have growth capacity which is a major constraint in San Francisco that are maxed out with upward pressure on prices, no supply and tremendous demand. Even though i dont have 1 billion we have a 400 million miami forever bond, with 100 million of that being affordable housing, what i call 0 basis land underutilized with those 100 million, with the private sector, 750 units of affordable housing. If you extrapolate then out, 7500 units with tremendous amount of leverage with 2 billion worth of leverage we will continue to do that, we are expanding the community redeveloped agency which would produce 250, 400 million worth of new money we leverage at the same rate. We are using under zone land, public land and public dollars, or public bond dollars to make sure we can keep prices at a rate where we can attract engineers, doctors and nurses and Police Officers which has been becoming more expensive though we are seeing enormous urban renewal push in the city. It happened in other cities in stockton, theres a renaissance in the city and what we have to do, sorry for cannibalizing the beginning of this interview, you have to reinvest in quality of life. It is one, to have it is wonderful to have great weather, a huge event we obviously highlight but you need to have a tremendous scene, one of the biggest in the world and the sports venues, one of two in the us that has formula one. We have all the major sports, qualityoflife dynamic, what you alluded to which is true in this virtual worlds, everyone is working remotely, where we have to live and miami is doing well in that competition. For those watching, by email, read w aip. Pr on aip aip. Org or twitter, hashtag post 2020 mayors. You can send those in at any time and i can read them off later. By turning to you, congratulations on your recent victory. You defeated a rising star in the party and that helps people by surprise. Backup a little bit and tell us about why you got in the race in the first place, you chose to run for mayor of stockton, the most diverse city in the country with a lot of head wind during the pandemic, lots of unrest. What is motivating you, what did you hope to achieve and what are the voters expecting from you . Thank you for this opportunity to join you, if i had known, it reconsidered from a security standpoint, i wouldnt change anything that i would do in life, what was served in full time, in some level of Public Service, timing for me is important. The power of habit, completely shifted and actively involved the last 7 years at that time, and i have this thought that maybe i should run for mayor today, with the Wedding Party and a conversation about the city. Strike you . Its also going above the National Average also has some headwinds in terms of higher unemployment and similar challenges so what is your first 180 days approach to those sorts of things . Would you tackle first and why . Thats what we ran on i heard both talk about quality of life in the city that something we ran on locally with the quality of life in stockton and now leadership to be focused on addressing and to understand those fundamental needs of our communities so quality of life looks different for each city and community and municipalities over us where do you tackle first or how do you advertise that . When we find ourselves right now in the middle of this pandemic at the county and state level to have the impact on Small Businesses are those supports and with vaccines and things of those nature. But the one area from the quality of life standpoint that we have to focus on is the issue in and around homelessness. We all want a Safer Community is not a crime to be homeless obviously different people have different life circumstances we also understand what advice do not supersede so to find the balance that we have the support and the means necessary also improving the quality of life for the residents so 80 percent of our population is a number one issue. So we work really hard in the campaign to reach out to different municipalities to understand what is working and identify the solution that we can implement here in stockton but its about taking the next step. Not necessarily television but what is the practical next step and then to be transparent with the public with a Civic Engagement which was another opportunity as well in terms of improving the quality of life from a trust standpoint. So for me prioritizing Civic Engagement the public understands we are listening and we have those messages out heart and we expect the public to hold us accountable if we do everything we can to make sure the needs of our city are met. Coming back to the institution of trust but mayor, before we lose you, when it comes to the inequality problem that you talk about everybody has to deal with that in granular terms but for all of the growth and the dynamism you are fostering in miami for those on the lower income, how do they see miami right now . They are struggling with job losses and sickness and the light so when you are speaking to communities that are in a tough spot what do you hear from them and what is it you are doing that you find resonates with their aspirations what are you hearing from them. And their aspirations. No doubt particularly because of the pandemic no doubt people are going hungry or concerned about their homes or foreclosing on their mortgages so we have done what we can given the resources. I think this sort of tech renaissance we are seeing in miami is about creating longterm opportunities for residents, it begins with education. If we are serious about combating income inequality, we have to be prepared for the economy and digital tools, giving every child access to broadband and giving every child access to a curriculum that makes them successful, taught in every single school, in high school and those ingredients in place and are not there yet, that is where we are creating a pipeline for the new jobs we are creating and until we get there, we are still creating higherpaying jobs, somebody has to occupy them but to deal with income inequality and create class mobility and be successful government cant mandate that, that is not the way it works and hasnt in the history of humanity, people who want to work hard and want to succeed or have an opportunity, in a certain family that is what we are trying to achieve in terms of resiliency, we call it miami for every one. Thank you for being here and if anyone has questions through those channels we can forward them if there is contact with the mayors team and they can be responsive. Good luck with everything going on in miami, a busy place, look forward to seeing you at these future aie events. So many wonderful people as a result of the organization and leave you in better hands. A pleasure meeting you, Francis Suarez. Good to see you. I know when you were in the middle of a lot of unrest because of the George Floyd Killing and subsequent events, you met with community protesters, people in the community, what did you learn and what did you do to maintain by comparison that is peaceful and stable, things going well and differently compared to other cities. The government is nonpartisan, lends itself to being more responsive to the needs of diverse communities, whether it is a mix to them both, one of the top four issues is unique, we are a Diverse Community in Oklahoma City. The decision is disproportionately dominated by worldviews of guys who look like me but the culture will experience growing up in Oklahoma City. When all of that happened it resonated with things that i was talking about and i dont need me people marching in the streets, i recognized is something going on and we need to talk and it is the third day of events in Oklahoma City where i sit down and met with leadership for black lives matter, and surprise the protesters and listen to them, we didnt have any more damage or violence, we acted also, performative gesture, we created a task force, we are an outlier, a large city that we dont have one, and we have been clearly intentional leading the way on this in talking about all the issues and challenges facing the Minority Community and putting everything on the table and acknowledging the promise of america is equal opportunity but never. Here, a white kid who grows up as the affluent part of town will have a different educational outcome, better economic outcome, literally a longer life than an African American kid who grows up 10 miles away from that point. How many decades does that go on before we say what we did in for 60s isnt enough. And those of the conversations that happened in june, accelerated, whether it is other elected leadership, this is not something we addressed in a few weeks or a few months, the work of a lifetime, the work in my comm