This week’s things to know:

States Preempt Cities Almost to the Point of Irrelevance (Governing)

Who knows what's best for residents - state or local leaders? I'm a believer that most of the challenges in our communities can and should be resolved at the local level. There are certainly some things that are best addressed at the federal and state level, but for most things, locally elected officials are the ones who understand the issues the best, know what their constituents (often their friends, neighbors, and coworkers) value and need, and can maximize resources to achieve shared goals. Here in Texas, the Governor and state leadership has been steadily working to undermine local control, dictating what services to provide and how (or not), and capping critical revenue streams like property tax. As this article suggests, the pandemic has exacerbated this further across the country. The path we're on is making it increasingly difficult for cities to provide services with the resources they have, and the state and federal government (so far) have not provided sufficient funding to support the growing number of (unfunded) mandates. Here in Texas, this will be a key focus of the ongoing legislative session, and I suspect this year's will make the previous session pale in comparison. Get your popcorn ready… -Kevin

A Bottom-Up Infrastructure Strategy for American Renewal (Rice University) 

Here at Verdunity, we talk often about the resource gap that most all cities face, while encouraging local leaders to do the math and formulate a plan to attack that gap systematically and incrementally. This report just put out yesterday by the Kinder Institute assembles information collected by a survey of infrastructure priorities in 100 metro areas and 134 cities. The survey focused on asking them to identify their top five infrastructure priorities and infrastructure projects that soared in priority because of the health crisis. The report then expands into the need for bottom-up thinking and how to embark on a journey to a different kind of infrastructure strategy for our nation. -AJ

Wasting Time, Wasting Money (StrongTowns)

Our work focuses on helping city leaders align their vision, policy, and investments with what citizens are willing and able to pay for. We encourage cities to do the math to better understand the fiscal performance of their development pattern and service model and the fiscal impacts of development and infrastructure projects. This process is especially helpful when looking to educate, build consent, and shift development policy in a community. We also advocate strongly for incremental (small) development and taking immediate actions to incrementally improve quality of life and close the resource gap. This combination of using fiscal sustainability as a common language to prioritize and filter decisions and incremental development is the recipe to cultivate fiscal health and local wealth in your community! (Note: if you'd like to hear Chuck and I talk more about this topic, register for the Strong Towns Local Motive Tour and check out the session we recorded on Go/No-Go: doing the math on development) -Kevin

The Year Global Health Went Local (GatesNotes) 

In a year like no other I felt that it was necessary to take time and reflect. Not only a personal reflection but one that looked back at all that happened over the course of 2020. The GatesNotes blog captures some poignant moments in time through some sound writing, but does a particularly good job of giving context and concrete examples of what should/could come next for a world that has been struggling to find a foothold to climb out of one of the greatest struggles we have faced. -Ryan

Expert Tips for Leading and Engaging Employees in Change (Quantum Workplace)

This piece talks about something all city managers and department heads wanting to do things differently has to face, head-on: leading and engaging others in change. While the five stages they identified are labeled as the five stages of "crisis management", they're universally applicable. I especially liked that each section offers questions for reflection. If you're a leader open to introspection, this is a great piece. It covers the requirement to  understand the needs of your employees, create clarity, regain momentum, and adapt. -AJ

The Top 5 Things 2020 Taught Us About Remote Work (Inc.)

Remote work is here to stay. This is a short, 5 point list of lessons learned from 2020 and things I'm definitely working on within our team. -Kevin

Here's the standard disclaimer: We always encourage our team members to freely share their thoughts and opinions, both in these newsletters and elsewhere. Given that, opinions expressed by any one member do not necessarily represent the views of the company as a whole.

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Hey, friends in local government:

Hey, friends who love cities! If you're looking for a place to discuss these topics (and more) with like-minded peers who want to help create a more resilient community, check out our Community Cultivators Network. It's free to join, and we are currently working to build new features for our 2021 relaunch, so stay tuned! We'll arm you with the content, ideas, and support to take small impactful steps to cultivate change.