News

Watch: 4 Cities Talk About How They Innovated to Improve Equity

As participants in the City Accelerator initiative, these four cities have created smart, successful programs to better serve their residents.

Creating Systems Change in Your City: 4 Lessons From the Front Lines

After helping a dozen cities implement policy innovations through the City Accelerator initiative, these experts offer some best practices.

Reflections on Innovation

Some observations after nearly four years of reporting on the City Accelerator

Innovation Stands the Test of Time

A look back at the three cities that started it all reveals ideas worth stealing and replicating.

Equity: Trending but Not Trendy

Equity is not a new word to public policy discussion but its recent popularity reflects a change in perspective

Educate, Embed, Empower: Turning Small Interventions into Ongoing Improvement

How the City of Philadelphia is using the City Accelerator to apply proven techniques and operate more efficiently and effectively.

What It Means to Get Engaged: A Roadmap for Cities

New resources available for cities that aim to develop and kick-start a robust public engagement strategy.

Accelerate This: Helping Citizens Successfully Re-enter Their Communities After Prison

How They Did It: Baltimore

Accelerate This: Utilizing a People-Centered Approach to Engagement

How They Did It: Seattle

Accelerate This: Ensuring All Residents Can Be Entrepreneurs

How They Did It: Albuquerque

Accelerate This: Including Residents’ Voices in Redevelopment Efforts

How They Did It: Atlanta

Accelerate This: Making Healthcare More Accessible to Underserved Communities

How They Did It: New Orleans

Moving from Process to Results: Growing a Culture of Innovation in City Government

What the Evaluators Saw: What the Cities Did, How They Did It, and Why It Matters

Accelerate This: Getting the Assistance Seniors Deserve

How They Did It: Philadelphia

Accelerate This: City Hall meets Shark Tank

How They Did It: Nashville

Podcast: Inspiring, Enabling, and Teaching Teams to Become Public Entrepreneurs

A pop-up podcast recorded with a live audience that captures key learnings from the cities that learned them - detailed here with a full transcript.

Podcast: Building a New Urban Practice, City by City

A pop-up podcast recorded with a live audience that captures key learnings from the cities that learned them - detailed here with a full transcript.

Podcast: A People-Centric Approach to Producing Impact for Low-Income Residents

A pop-up podcast recorded with a live audience that captures key learnings from the cities that learned them - detailed here with a full transcript.

Lessons From the Field for and by Civic Innovation Teams

The experience of Louisville, Nashville, and Philadelphia can inform the work of innovation teams in your city.

Accelerate This: Building a Pipeline of Innovations

How They Did It: Louisville

Bureaucracy Gives Way to Innovation: The Nashville Model

How Nashville Metro pivoted toward the future

New Ways of Thinking in Nashville

A special (but simple) bus pass helps homeless population get to shelter in extreme weather.

Philadelphia’s Common Sense Approach to Helping the Working Poor

Can changing how you address an envelope improve communication with your constituents? Philadelphia aimed to find out.

3 Ways Cities Can Promote Innovation Up and Down the Food Chain

Change in government requires empowering and energizing its employees.

Innovation in 140 Characters or Less

The Governing Summit in Louisville, Ky., provided unique ways for participants to share ideas.

Evaluating Policy Takes Too Long: Here's What You Can Do About It

Governments can use this approach from the world of design to help them effectively and quickly evaluate new policies.

Making City Hall Leaner

How can government build tools that people like?

The Challenge of Making Sure Innovation 'Sticks'

The original champions of change might move on, but their ideas don't have to leave with them.

Urban Innovation for All, by All: A Mayor’s Perspective

Innovation is our opportunity to bring our heads, hearts and hands to bear on the challenges and opportunities of our time.

Video Archive: Summit on Government Performance and Innovation

Archive of Live Stream and Live Blog from Louisville

An Interactive Gathering for City Leaders

The convening focuses on solving urban problems through synergy and innovation.

What the VW Beetle Can Teach Us About Housing

Is it time to “think small” to be more innovative and sustainable in our urban developments?

Innovation Guide Promotes New Culture of Civic Exploration

The guide's action-oriented framework supports a spirit of adventure and change in urban communities.

Small City, Big Innovations, Huge Progress

The community in Fitchburg, Mass., came together to solve youth crime and budget challenges.

Breaking Through Barriers to Innovation in Local Government

Through the City Accelerator, Louisville, Ky., Nashville, Tenn., and Philadelphia are adapting how they do business in order to produce materially different results.

New Implementation Guide for Local Government Innovation

A new City Accelerator guide addresses some of the key barriers to innovation in local government and provides a path forward for cities to follow.

VIDEO: Democracy and Stitching Together a New Public

Innovation is needed to make democracy work.

True Resilience Means Cities Must Plan for Poverty-Stricken Citizens

Weather-related events are often catastrophic for urban poor.

One Maine City's Stand against Cutting Funding at Homeless Shelters

Portland, Maine, is ignoring state instructions that could discourage people from seeking shelter beds.

Doubling Down on the Innovation-Team Model

Another 14 cities are about to build their own "i-teams." No longer an experimental approach, it's a proven route to cross-cutting accomplishments.

Hunger, Homelessness Continue to Rise in U.S. Cities

An annual report shows Washington, D.C., led the nation this year in increases in emergency food assistance requests and homelessness. See how your city compares.

Want to Innovate? Determine Your City's Greatest Need and Get to Work

Governments must ask themselves critical questions before change can happen.

Where's Your Pothole?

Additional innovation is needed for infrastructure issues that aggravate the public.

A Two-Generation Approach to Poverty

A new report advocates more programs that address the needs of parents and children simultaneously.

Changes to Obamacare Could Bring Opportunity for Innovation

Low-income individuals can benefit from incremental improvements to the health care law.

Turning Governments into Innovation Machines

The key is "intrapreneurship" — establishing a public-sector culture that rewards disruption from within.

The Progress and Promise of Pittsburgh's Turnaround

After years of decline, the city is making gains, and Mayor Bill Peduto’s administration represents a new brand of politics that’s moving into big cities across America.

The Website That Could End Homelessness in Los Angeles

L.A. County is using a computerized system to link homeless people with the social services that best fit their needs.

Technology Takes on Hunger

Interactive Web tools and virtual platforms help city officials break down barriers to food access.