Obama supports cities, McCain does not

An editorial  —  8/03/2008 8:09 am

Mayors from across the country are in Madison this week for the Mayors Innovation Project summer conference.

They'll be sharing ideas about how to run progressive communities in tight economic times.

But they will, as well, be wondering whether they are going to have a partner in the federal government.

That's something cities have lacked for the past eight years.

This week in an interview with MayorTV, an initiative of the Drum Major Institute think tank to focus on urban leaders and issues, Santa Fe Mayor David Coss argues that the Bush/Cheney administration's response has been characterized by "ignorance" as opposed to engagement.

And Coss suggests that John McCain will make things worse for urban areas.

"I'm for Senator Obama," says Coss, echoing the sentiment of Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz and so many other urban leaders who have gotten on the bandwagon of the Democratic presidential candidate.

Obama, who worked as a community activist in Chicago and then represented a portion of that city in the Illinois Senate, knows cities. And he has developed a smart urban agenda that is genuinely in tune with the sentiments of America's mayors and the communities they lead.

"Yes, we need to fight poverty. Yes, we need to fight crime," Obama told the U.S. Conference of Mayors this year. "Yes, we need to strengthen our cities. But we also need to stop seeing our cities as the problem and start seeing them as the solution. Because strong cities are the building blocks of strong regions, and strong regions are essential for a strong America."

The senator from Illinois backed that statement up by pledging to advance a $60 billion, 10-year program of infrastructure development that would provide aid in building and repairing the roads, rail networks, electrical grids, water systems and the telecommunications networks that link metropolitan areas.

That was in marked contrast to Republican John McCain, who has not just neglected to develop a strong urban agenda but has described urban transportation and public safety initiatives as "pork."

Mayors are worried about McCain, and rightly so.

"I feel like we don't have another eight years to waste invading countries that aren't a threat to us, propping up the profits of oil companies, ignoring the problems of working families and middle-class families in the cities. I don't think we have the time," says Santa Fe's Coss.

The mayor's sense of urgency is appropriate.

George Bush never gave urban areas a reason to support him, and they never did.

That broken relationship needs to be replaced with a functional one, not just for cities but for the whole of a country that cannot afford to neglect the engines of economic, artistic and social progress that cities have always been.

An editorial  —  8/03/2008 8:09 am