I had the opportunity to attend the recent national meeting of CEOs for Cities. This is one of the first organizations I came into contact with as we began exploring new and innovative strategies being used to create economic prosperity in communities across the county and the world.  Its annual meetings have always been a great way to meet people involved in economic development, non-profit work, foundations and local government among others and network, learn and steal ideas.

While the focus of the meeting was on collaboration, one of the recurring themes from speakers was that city leaders are on their own when it comes to working to make their communities better places.  Certainly, we should expect little or no help from the federal government. Even when they get their act back together, the fact is that federal resources will increasingly be directed toward mandatory spending, squeezing out discretionary program spending such as CDBG that communities have used to improve quality of life.

So let me repeat what I heard in the strongest possible terms.  First from Bruce Katz of the Brookings Institution who noted that power and responsibility for getting things done is clearly being forced down to city leaders and those finding success understand that the restructured economy relies on innovation and creativity. Furthermore, they also understand that cities are made up of not just governments but networks, and successful networks build upon their unique assets. Most importantly however is the fact that metros thrive only when their cores thrive.

Anil Menon, President of Cisco Smart+Connected Communities, followed the next day by telling people that the answers to creating wealth and prosperity lies within our cities. That there is not time waste in “waiting till later” and that cities cannot continue to address issues in silos. If you look at your city and say this is not what I would build today, you need to start over. And, while its fine to act locally, you better have a global focus.

The next several years will continue to be disruptive and full of change. We need to be spending our time, energy and resources on what counts…developing our assets and getting about the business of building our economy.