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American Morning
New Orleans Mayor Morial Discusses Report on American Cities' Clout
Aired July 10, 2001 - 11:43 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: There's been a push on by the mayors of more than 1,000 American cities to sell urban living and working. A report out today shows people and businesses, apparently, are listening to that push.
Our Eileen O'Connor is in the federal city, Washington, D.C.
Hi -- Eileen.
EILEEN O'CONNOR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Daryn.
Well, it's being called the Renaissance of the American city: Powerful economic development over the past 10 years has strengthened the pulse of the nation's 1,100 cities. If you compare city economies with the output of nations, you would find New York ranks behind only 13 countries -- that's right, countries -- ahead of Australia's economic output. Los Angeles, at 17th on the list, complied by Standard & Poor' DRI has a larger economy than Russia. And Dallas, at 35th on the list, packs more economic clout than the Asian giant Thailand.
The city of New Orleans has been part of the boom. The average home selling price there is up 52 percent in seven years. That's when a new emphasis on improving the police department began cutting crime by 40 percent. A number of capital improvement and an upgrading of transportation also contributed to the comeback of New Orleans.
Marc Morial has been mayor since 1994 and is the president of U.S. conference of mayors.
MAYOR MARC MORIAL, NEW ORLEANS: Thanks, Eileen.
O'CONNOR: Thanks so much for joining us.
I wanted to ask you what are the keys to New Orleans' success.
MORIAL: I think improving public safety and cleaning up corruption in the police department has been the foundation of our success. It's led to increases in home ownership and a more favorable investment climate and the strengthening of our economy. Behind that has been partnerships, mayors and city government working with faith- based organizations, working with business leaders, working with community-based leaders, working with officials at both the state and federal level. It takes a team to rebuild a city.
O'CONNOR: We've seen that this economic growth, though, can be good and bad. I mean, housing prices up 52 percent. Does that drive out some of the people that make cities a melting pot, make them elitist?
MORIAL: We don't want that to happen. The key to cities is that cities have always been diverse gumbos, rainbows, melting pots of people from various races, income levels, and backgrounds, and that's why it's very important that the nation's private and public sectors work on affordable housing production programs, so that we don't take the difficult neighborhoods of the inner cites and simply move them to the old outer ring suburbs. That's an important thing. We've got to manage this Renaissance, this comeback, so that we don't repeat the problems of the past.
O'CONNOR: Now very quickly, what's the purpose of -- you've got a 10-city competitive city tour -- and what's really the purpose of this report? What are you trying to do here?
MORIAL: We want to highlight a very simple point: As the cities go, so goes the nation, that cities are where almost 90 percent of the new jobs were created in the 1990s. If we want the nations's economic revival to continue, we will invest in American cities.
O'CONNOR: Thank you, Marc Morial, the mayor of San Francisco.
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