Institutionalize relationship building with potential leaders

GOPC will document the efforts of economic development organizations to retain local jobs and local talent by building relationships with managers and executives from companies with a presence in the community. These meetings are especially important for setting expectations that they will be a part of the city’s civic fabric, even if they do not plan to stay in the community long-term. read more

A key component of strong civic capacity is a robust pipeline for new talent.

Many smaller legacy cities are facing the dual challenge of population loss and an aging workforce. Other cities that have seen an influx of immigrant populations are struggling to incorporate young people from different cultural backgrounds into their leadership cohort. In either case, communities can approach the challenge of building a talent pipeline by engaging young people, particularly high school students, to give them a better sense of local opportunities. read more

Sometimes, resources from outside of a community can help to build local capacity for the long-term.

A number of federal programs seek to build capacity in distressed communities, either directly or indirectly. The Strong Cities, Strong Communities (SC2) initiative, a program of the Obama Administration, worked in specific communities to align the resources of 19 federal agencies toward building local capacity. read more

Empowering residents is an important aspect of building strong civic capacity.

Residents who feel that they have the ability to impact their neighborhood and their city are more likely to be satisfied with where they live and contribute their time, skills, and resources to broader revitalization efforts. Small, inexpensive neighborhood projects can give residents the opportunity to impact their community in a positive way, while also building up neighborhood capacity to tackle even larger challenges. read more

Place-based fellowship programs can help strengthen the pipeline for filling key leadership roles in smaller legacy cities’ civic sector.

These programs seek to recruit top talent into public or civic-sector roles by providing fellows, who are typically recent graduates, with the opportunity to do impactful, high-level work early in their careers. Although fellowship positions are short-term, the goal of these programs is to retain talent in the community, even if not at the agency where the fellowship took place. read more