Brewed Fresh Daily

via Peter McDermott @ LocalFoodCleveland.org >

Each year SustainLane releases the “most complete report card on urban sustainability in America”, which ranks the 50 largest cities in categories like air quality, green economy, metro congestion etc.

This year Cleveland placed first in two categories: local food/agriculture and water supply.

As I see it, these are arguably the two most important categories in the entire study. Without a sustainable food and water supply, the basic functions of a city cannot be met. As the challenges we face in creating a sustainable regional economy become more pressing, it is essential that we have this basic infrastructure in place to meet the needs of our city. It’s great to see that we’re getting national recognition for all of the hard work being done by leaders in Northeast Ohio.

The report notes “12 farmers’ markets and 225 community gardens reported, serving truckloads of fresh food to its population of over 450,000. A nearly 600 percent increase in total number of farmers’ markets and a sizable increase in community gardens since 2006 explain Cleveland’s ascent in this rankings category.”

In fact, Cleveland has over 20 farmers’ markets but we’ll let that slide.

There’s a new blog in town (or, the region, really): NEohioNEXT.
The blog explores new pathways to prosperity in Northeast Ohio.
First up: Some thoughts on Bill Callahan’s post this weekend.

Bill Callahan has produced an important post and memorandum on the community impacts of any bailout legislation that Congress considers.

Jim Rokakis is fond of pointing out that nobody cared when financial blood was running in the streets of Cleveland, but now that blood is running in Wall Street it’s a national crisis. The deal that stops the bleeding on Wall Street and gives the banks a new start must do the same for the streets of Cleveland, Detroit, Cincinnati and Chicago.

What communities like Cleveland need in the bank bailout bill

Up at the Lowe Foundation for a retreat. One of my colleagues is from Sustainable Business Network Philadelphia.

An interesting insight from our discussions this morning: Older, slower growth industrial regions may have a competitive advantage in implementing new strategies and tools for sustainability. The reason: Sustainability strategies are much more difficult to implement in fast growing regions.

More on the opportunities on slower growth cities from Lev Gonick.

West Michigan Strategic Alliance has become one of the leading regions in the country when it comes to building regional alliances. I’ll be heading up there shortly to start distilling some lessons from what they have learned. The Council on Competitiveness will also be integrating some of the lessons from West Michigan in their work on regional leadership.

Here’s one of their initiatives:

3rd Annual Natural Connections Summit 2008
Locally Green, Regionally Connected

Learn more.

Could NEO do something similar?

Something’s going on in Philadelphia to improve education…Leaders in Cleveland could take a trip…

It’s Our City.

Watch especially Mayor Nutter’s September 11 speech on education here: Children as the most important citizens of Philadelphia.

Philadelphia Compact

Philadelphia Education Fund

The Milken Institute has produced its latest list of the best performing cities in the country. You can explore the rankings from this page.

The Kauffman Foundation has released a report that explores important topic of improving student outcomes by reforming teacher compensation. You can download a copy of the report from this page.

Materials on the Brookings/Greater Ohio summit held this week are available here.

In case you missed it, here’s the PD story by Tom Breckenridge.

Here are couple of other articles that covered the Summit:

Report: Competition holding back growth of Ohio’s major cities

Ohio Conference Calls for Major Makeovers

On a day when hundreds of Ohio leaders gathered to discuss the serious competitive challenges facing our state, the U.S. economy shows continued serious weakness, the financial markets still try to settle after the U.S. government engineers the world’s largest bailout, investment bank Lehman Brothers stands on the brink of another bailout, the recognition starts hitting home that our poor educational performance is creating severe competitive consequences, and the bleeding of petrodollars accelerates, the Republican Party and the McCain campaign skirt the edge of legality and absurdity by talking about putting lipstick on pigs.

Shameful.