“Portland‘s pioneering approach to regional governance has gone from being a good idea to being an imperative. In every community, regional cooperation has become a necessity to address the challenges of the present and future.”
REGIONS DRIVE OUR ECONOMIES AND DETERMINE THE QUALITY OF OUR LIVES
Regions vary in size from a handful of neighboring communities to metropolitan conglomerations of cities and counties. They are big enough to provide the components critical to economic competitiveness and the amenities desired for quality of life, yet small enough to work together to address the thorniest common challenges.
REGIONS KEEP EVOLVING ORGANICALLY
Community leaders and citizens are now realizing that regional human settlements are living organisms.
More urban ones have vital organs—downtown business and cultural districts, suburban employment centers and shopping malls, residential neighborhoods and recreational areas, tied together by the sinews of transportation and the arteries of commerce, and, it is hoped, wrapped in a skin of community. More rural ones tie together smaller settlements in close proximity that are evolving along similar paths.
Unlike national, state and local governments, whose boundaries are often the product of political compromises insensitive to their changing populations, regional boundaries follow the evolution of their organic settlements.
DIVIDING UP REGIONS HAS BEEN A DISASTER
Regions have been divided up historically, pitting local government and interest groups against each other, and unleashed interjurisdictional inequities and profligate sprawl. Moreover, all too many have failed to help the struggling individuals, declining jurisdictions, and threatened habitats that are critical to staying competitive in the global marketplace.
Reconnecting them, as equitably and ecologically as possible, is critical to saving regions, restoring their health and empowering them to resolve the most pressing common challenges.
And reconnecting these divided up living regional organisms -- governing them -- has been almost impossible for even the most dedicated regional citizens who are often limited to muddling through regional challenges playing “pick-up” regional cooperation.
REGIONS NEED CHARTERS TO BE GOVERNED EFFECTIVELY
Regions, metropolitan and rural, are called home by most of the globe’s citizens.
Regional Charters are needed to ensure that all citizen views and experiences are heard across all sectors, equitably. And guarantee that rich and poor jurisdictions are making decisions together in the same room. Regional Charters will not guarantee interjurisdictional equity nor renewable growth, but will provide the governance capacity that is not currently available to practice it. Finally, Regional Charters provide the capacity to collaborate with other levels of governance -- from neighborhood to global.
Regional Charters will be uniquely prepared by the citizens and community leaders in each region and empower them to play "championship" regional governance.
“‘Regional Charters’ is the deeply considered and comprehensive analysis of a pre-eminent thought leader on American regions. What’s more, it is utterly useful— a virtual encyclopedia of compelling concepts and practical strategies embedded in a solid organizing framework. It lays out a coherent agenda for empowering civic leaders, professionals and activists to create new civic infrastructure to address our most pressing regional challenges. ”