Talking Points For Media Inquiries

What is the Partnership for Regional Livability?

We are currently at the very beginning stages of creating a partnership of regional business, government, and community leaders who will explore ways for making our communities more livable. We envision the group examining such quality of life issues as economic competitiveness, open space preservation, downtown reinvestment, transportation systems, workplace development and urban sprawl to determine what is and is not working within each region. Our goal is to determine how federal and state agencies can help implement regional plans, rather than hand down government-led mandates and expect communities to implement them.

For example, in the last election cycle, there were more than 250 local ballot initiatives aimed at curbing the negative impacts of sprawl. The fact that these initiatives varied greatly in different regions of the country demonstrates the need for taking a local approach to these problems. We are much to early in the process to elaborate any further, but we look forward to sharing more details with the media as soon as they are available.

When might that be?

We are still working on putting together pilot sites and identifying partners and are not yet ready to release further details.

Who is involved in this project?

Since the need to create more livable communities is something that effects all Americans, it is important that the partnership reflect a diverse group of community organizations, grassroots advocates, business leaders, and policymakers. We are in the process of reaching out to a broad spectrum of people, but it is still too early to know definitive list of partners.

Isn't this really just a Gore campaign vehicle?

No, this is not a Gore campaign vehicle. Quality of life is a bipartisan issue that effects all Americans. This project will address a broad spectrum of issues and will represent a diverse set of stake holders. Creating more livable communities has been an important issue for years - long before Vice President Gore described his Livability Agenda.

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Last updated March 24, 1999.