Yeah. You are right. But thank you Janet thank you all for having me. First off. Full disclosure some friends. In the in the audience. My predecessor. Actually two before me but longtime executive director for the latter reason permission Harry West and longtime friend and civic mentor. I'm so happy to see and hear everything I get wrong Harry will tell you about. And also my colleague Shane Heyse saw a long time tenure at the at the lateral Commission she started out of high school. That's why she's so young looking but Jane is the director for our center for livable communities and. I'll try to explain a little bit of a what that means in a minute. Then it's some other long term frontier Lindora. Who's a vice president with Georgia Tech here an executive assistant to the president. I have known Lance and well we all say how many of us we know each other. Let's just say it's been a wonderful friendship for many years to seize Now both my wife and I my wife is also. Alumni of Georgia Tech so strong strong tech affiliation for years and very proud and happy for. I thought I talk a little bit today about the Regional Commission and our role in fluent seeing state and local policy and where we fit into the niche because regional commissions are not things that most people have any familiarity with it's not part of your everyday experience. You know you don't get a tax bill from a Regional Commission at least not in Georgia. You know you don't call up the Regional Commission to find out what's happening with a zoning request. So we're not part of the normal lexicon of a typical citizen or resident but we have a very important role. So I want talk about that but before I do that. Let me just take a step back a minute and say why do regions matter. I ask the question to you and I will ask you and I'm going to answer myself but why do regions matter why do we care about anything regional. If we cared about it we wouldn't create a local government for right. But we don't we're having government structure for regional government it's local and it's state and it's federal. So why do we care about it a regional This is going to be interactive whether you like it or not you will be asking questions and hi Michael. How are you good to see you again. OK or are like you think that I mean you go from OK to synchronise a lot of government structures that certainly is a good role they can play. Yes ma'am. So those are all good reasons and if we stay here and talk about. Thirty more minutes. You could all give me a lot more let me give you an overview from my perspective of why regions matter not necessarily a or series of commissions but why regions matter for the first time in the history of humanity over fifty percent of people live in cities and their suburban regions or metropolitan areas as opposed to enroll countrysides the first time in the history of humanity that we've been able to document right now. So who cares. Why do people go to cities and and their surrounding regions primarily for economic opportunity want to make a livelihood. That's where jobs are those where economic opportunity where there's a concentration or locus of economic activity you feel you have an opportunity to make a living there either by offering an expertise selling the good whatever else right. Providing a service. The top one hundred regions the top one hundred metropolitan regions in the United States composed twelve percent of the land of the United States but they are sixty five percent of the population or seventy percent of the gross to metric the gross domestic product and their seventy no seventy five percent of the gross domestic product or seventy percent of international trade for the United States. So the United States economy is really the economy of one hundred plus regions for all intent purposes so that wasn't the way it was one hundred years ago. But that's the way it's become now. And how regions trade with each other how reasons relate to each other and how regions are growing or dying or getting stale or whatever may be the case has very much an impact. What happens for us as a nation in terms of the global economy. All right so just from a big point of view regions do matter and as such institutions that have some kind of a regional nature have a relevancy hopefully. Original planning is this by the fact that urban planning has been going on for a while. In the scheme of the life of the nation. It's still a fairly young profession. If you think about medicine if you think about law they go back hundreds and hundreds of years engineering thousands of years planning urban planning a result planning is still a fairly young profession as on compared on that scale. So the predecessor of the Atlanta result commission the Metropolitan Planning Commission that was founded in one thousand nine hundred seven was the first multi-county planning agency in the country. Go figure. We had the first one and we're still having all these problems still can't get together. But we had the very first one of the United States and it was significant the first state that planned a state Planning Act was actually by one I guess. No it's not Georgia but New York. No California no. No. Illinois I know why nine hundred sixty one the very first state Planning Act in the United States was passed by the state of Hawaii. The newest state. To the fifty state Confederation How about there. I don't know the. Reasons why they did it but at least they did. So planning is still a relatively young profession. And they are see in its current configuration kind of came about through the years I guess nine hundred seventy one was Harry Twenty nine hundred seventy one that we were established in our current configuration. In one thousand nine hundred ninety Georgia legislature passed a law that kind of overhauled and strengthen the state Planning Act for Georgia. And subsequent to that years later we had sixteen Reed sixteen regional development centers. They were consolidated into twelve regional commissions of which we are the largest one. So that's how things stand in Georgia now we are the largest but only one of twelve original commissions so all one hundred fifty nine counties in Georgia are divided up and they automatically are in a Regional Commission. They don't have a choice. Which is part of the tension and sometimes they want to be and sometimes they don't want to be in. What we call a reason a commission here in Georgia has equivalent forms and other states but different names. So it's some states you'll hear the term Council of Governments in some states you hear planning commissions metropolitan metropolitan planning commissions or council governments or association of governments but by and large we're all regional councils. And that's that's the name that by which we group us together as an industry. So nationally there's a national association of regional councils in Georgia. We have the George Association recent councils but. If you hear regional council planning commission Council of Government. You can pretty well assume that most of us do have a lot of similarities more so than disability. We're all different but we. A lot in common and you have planning commissions that have purely advisory kind of roles and therefore very little authority on paper sandbag. San Diego Association of governments in Southern California San Diego has a large operational portfolio. They own a toll road they operate transit and integrate a lot of their transportation planning because they can have direct control over a lot of revenue source for transportation as well as thinking about how to move how to help people move around their region because they control those things directly. The Met Council Metropolitan Council of Minneapolis St Paul the Twin City Planning area. Operates their reason a waste water and water system. They operate their storm water system but they also do comprehensive land use planning which they don't control zoning but it's just an advisory for their local governments. So they have both of those at A R C. We do very little in the way of direct service delivery. We work as are the local governments are our customers they did live or services directly to to citizens. So what kinds of things as they are see do. I'm sorry I keep on doing all this and I'm talking I'm not showing anything that's not fair is it. OK I'm so busy talking. And you're all mesmerized by what I'm saying you're not even paying attention to the board. Thank you. Let my say let me start by saying I was a R.C. govern well. A R C is governed by a thirty nine member board. We have ten count of. Chairman or the to cap C.E.O. is also that equivalent. We have. Mayors that represent each of nine counties and one mayor represented from each of nine counties except Fulton Fulton has a mayor there represents North Fulton a separate mayor that represents South Fulton and of course the mayor Atlanta is a standing next official member as well as well as and Atlanta City Council member selected by the council. So twenty three elected officials. Ten County Commission Chairman. Twelve mayors when you call them all together and I said a lot of city council members. And then our ten county area is divided up into fifteen equal population districts and we have a citizen represented from each of those fifteen districts. So that brings up to thirty eight. And the last person our board who is not voting but is ex-officio is person was appointed by the governor to represent the Department of Community Affairs which is our oversight agency. State oversight agency OK that's our board is made up. So what is a R.C. actually do we have a lot of roles and I put acronyms up here and I'm going to spout out the names and tell you what the role is and the numbers in parentheses are the counties for which we do the for. So region varies for us. Depending on what the role is a what have you talking about to begin with their land a reason a workforce board workforce development. So the United States Department of Labor passes down funds to states for training for remedial training for helping people gain skills to get into the workforce or increase their earning power in the workforce all that areas call workforce development and so the state department of. Aber along in our case with the governor's office of Workforce Development passes down funds to the regional workforce boards around the state every area in the state is covered by one. Elana recent workforce board actually cover seven of our team counties. Not all ten of them. Cobb County. Fulton County the cap County had their own workforce board. When that county could if they wanted to because they meet the size requirement have to be how many four hundred thousand people or more something like that five hundred thousand more but they choose not to. So they're part of the seven collective. And the city of Atlanta has its own workforce board so seven of the ten counties we cover next were our AAA for the region for the ten counties AAA No it's not an Automobile Association. We are the Area Agency on Aging and if you're sixty five plus you really want to pay attention to that the Area Agency on Aging every part of the United States is covered by a AAA some of them are connected with governments some of them are independent non-profits. However that area chooses to set that up in our case the ten county region has asked and designated A or C. to be the Area Agency on Aging for the ten counties. So all of the funds that come through into the region for things like Meals on Wheels human services transportation for seniors and disabled and also low income things of that nature come through us under the auspices of an area aging plan that we developed over four years and update and. And the AAA is the largest part of my budget. And it's the largest single staff that I have. The demands on this part of the staff on us as an agency are growing dramatically. All of us Baby Boomers are aging out retiring. Because the next one economic development district. Department of Commerce says if you want grant monies for economic development through the economic development ministration E.T.A. you have to have a designated economic development district. We are that for the ten counties. I'll talk about that a little bit more later on. We have a special designation in state law that no other reason Commission has and that is we are designated as the metropolitan Atlanta planning development commission. OK so what difference does it make as the M A P D C. We actually have on paper. A lot more authority and a lot broader array of services that we can provide the ten counties and the city governments within those ten counties. Should they choose. Solid Waste Management. They want to coordinate that in some form or fashion we could do it for. Storm water or even water management if they wanted us to coordinate that for them. We could do it but they have to want us to do it. That's never happened but we have a lot more authority under that piece of legislation that's never been invoked but it's there. Jane carry on with his if you want to add to that. And then of course we are Regional Commission which is basically a land use planning group where the Metropole or the staff or the Metropolitan George North Georgia water planning district. I wish somebody would give it easy name but we just call it the water planning district which is actually fifteen counties the courting counties plus five others. We have the staff we are not the board. The water district has an independent board some of arm. Members overlap by virtue of office the ten county commission chairs automatically overlap but there are other representatives on that board that have voting power and and official status that are not part of our board. So where the staff are both but it's not equal boards equivalent boards and then last that I mention this is what most people know us about we're Metropolitan Planning Organization and what does that mean we are the designated for coordinating fragile peace. Planning for transportation. And that's what most people when they know anything at all about us. They know where you are the guys who do the transportation plan. Yes we are and we do that for eighteen counties. Plus because of air quality purposes we have to coordinate with two other counties. So we think about our transportation planning area as a twenty County area. All right. Which is about to grow by the way. So there's the basic Regional Commission and the Area Agency on Aging is the same thing counties the water district those additional five counties which are haul four sized Barto to the west Paulding and cow we do in the southeast and then here is a twenty County area for transportation and air quality purposes. Yes ma'am. Marler OK with twelve recent commissions That's correct. Aha aha. It is complex it is a very complex animal and thank you for asking a question and and and the twenty County Transportation region is a great example of it. Those counties that are not in the Atlanta Regional Commission for. More reason to commission this which is land use planning and a few other things have the right to have legal representation on our transportation and air quality committee should they choose. For transportation planning they stay in their reasonal commission for transportation planning their federal transportation dollars come through us not through their home Regional Commission. We have to administrate in court all that. It is a very complex and very complex task but a labor of love. And as I have inferred. We're about this area is about to go to all our parts of twenty three counties. So. It is a very complex that Jane used to do that job. And she got promoted when she got promotions home I got Thank you so much. You know and she passed it on somebody else but and she did it very very well but it is a very complex task and we have one of the most unique M.P.O. in the country because of this. A lot of metropolitan areas most metropolitan areas. Have some natural geographical boundary mountains rivers lakes something that stops them from going from one place and their growth is someplace. We don't have any natural barriers that stop us from growing so we've radiated out in all directions and you know we slow down but that's what we continue to do. Which by the way as a matter that we bought brought to the attention of the Federal Department of Transportation. Just last month. Jane and I were up there Washington talking with a bit about a number of things and this is one things we talked about they have to begin to rethink the designating the designation for M.P.O. boundaries or at least think about. Belief for exceptions. Because this is becoming a war unworkable. Part of the boundary is not just where the growth is now but what we envision it to be in twenty years. And that's how the boundaries set but we can envision being all the way to Alabama to the southeast and all way to Tad new guy. In twenty years. It's not out of the reach of possibility but that is administratively and unwieldy thing to do. So we've got their attention and there. They're asking us to help them think through how we might might change our tweak federal policy in that regard. All right so. One of the major things that we do is we do any major a comprehensive plan and for years that a comprehensive plan consisted of a result of development plan which was land use and again we don't tell local communities how to do. Zoning but based upon their plans zoning based upon growth patterns and projected growth patterns we can project this land is likely to be used in this way and here are the impacts of that are the implications of that. So we do a comprehensive land use plan called the result development plan. We also separately for years did a regional transportation plan. R T P. Which has to look out what thirty years we can look up based upon the growth patterns and the population patterns and the employment patterns. Here is the best we can do transportation wise to try to meet the mobility needs this population and also stay with an air quality conformity. That's a critical critical limiter force the E.P.A.'s sides to our region. And air quality budget for particulates for carbon. I was a thank you. And for something else to use. Particular ozone which just goes to nitrogen oxides rocket Thank you. And so we have air quality budgets and what we have to do is forecasts how the growth of vehicle traffic and how Drea call traffic moves or stays congested how will that affect air quality in the out years and do we stay under and within the limits of that air quality budget because if we don't. That plan is not acceptable and we have to go back to the drawing board and rework it until it does so. Like I said for years we did these two somewhat separately but then years ago and I don't know when J. knows this better than I do and Harry. We are trying to weave those two together a lot more tightly than we had not just have one do a data dump into the other one. But really have wanted help inform each other and suggest different ways of growing in different parts of the region in order to have transportation be less of a burden. And vice versa. And with that we also created a program called livable centers initiative in one nine hundred ninety eight. That was Grant money to help communities either at the neighborhood scale city scale or county scale think about how to more tightly weave their development pattern with their transportation pattern in a local setting. So we could begin to concentrate more development in areas that did need to have new roads or road Whiting's to try to minimize minimize that. And we've had a lot of success with that which I can talk about in a minute. But plan twenty forty is the name of that plan. It's got five broad goal areas under which there are a number of objects serving people obviously the whole things that's the ultimate which is. All about preserving the environment. When we did Plan two thousand and forty we did it with the specific and deliberate notion of trying to have a triple bottom line of environment economy and equity people and places and things. OK so it was the first attempt to really weave notions of sustainability into the growth of the region and it's an excellent plan it's been an award winning plan. And we're about to do a May our first major update to it and next year two we're going to start a process in Hansen mobility growing the economy and then building community. So those are the five general goal areas so. As a part of plan twenty forty. We have really tried to focus I said on the triple bottom line how do we preserve and enhance our naturals basis and culture resources as well as how do we make the most effective use of the limited dollars that we have for transportation to get the most mobility out of it and how do we weave better community development patterns that put people closer to where they live close to where they work closer to where they worship or whatever else have you. And so we have a set of priorities that are in and in that plan which guide but are not prescriptive for local government and what a lot of what many of our county and city planning director will do what try to keep the uniqueness of their communities but build upon or reflect the principles in plan twenty forty as a part of their local. Development plans. So it's again it's not prescriptive because we have no authority to tell him what to do. We can't we can say boo and I don't care but many communities find it helpful to be guided by what we have here as well as the technical assistance we can offer them and thinking through their plans two years ago I think was two years ago the General Assembly passed a law that said regional commissions any local government that wants you to do their comprehensive development plan you have to deaf or free. They're trying to make they're trying to give incentives for local governments to really pay attention to be more thoughtful about planning. So instead of you be complaining about it cost you something. And when you can't afford it necessarily especially the smaller less resource communities. If you want to you can ask your local Regional Commission to do it for you. Now if they do it for you obviously were under the minimum requirements plan. We'll have so much time so many people go around but and we have actually done that for several communities now several communities now the last two years later when. It's good. I will tell you that it lead to can sometimes be seen its crown jewel it can sometimes be seen as the big thing to be feared. Whether the fear is justifiable or not I won't debate. But sometimes we're seen as both at the same time. And yeah that idea although what are two Georges has been changed that definitions change over time but still it's out there and if you think about the fact that we're like fifty two or fifty four percent of the population the state is in those ten counties. Sixty five percent of the students public school students in the state are in the fourteen school districts and to county. So yeah when we when we move if we move on something together we do have a lot of influence of the state. So a where the state goes I would say that the relationship with the state is historically up and down times sometimes good sometimes bad and Harry has much better insight into that than I do but in my tenure brief as it is been and my observation of previous years. I think our relationship with the state is improving at a practical level. The result transportation plan there are parts of that that has absolute sway over but there are large parts of that we have absolute way or rather of speaking on behalf of our member governments we have absolute sway. So for example there's a quality. I mean there's a category of projects in our transportation plan call C.-Max C M A. Q congestion mitigation air quality. Well I local governments can submit the projects that they want funded under C.-Max and there are certain qualifications obviously they have to improve congestion and they have to improve their quality. And then we select That's purely our. Gee that can give us advice and say hey you might want to consider this. But that's purely our decision but there are other parts of the transportation plan that a purely there is and we can offer advice all day long and then have to ignore. I mean they can ignore it or they can take the advice. So we have some things that we do have direct control over from from the state perspective and transportation and aging which I said is large part of my budget in large dollars. Because we have the greatest population of seniors. And we also have the greatest population of seniors that are poor. We tend to have a very influential role with the state's Division of aging as a part of the partner Human Services and egg. It's really more of a partnership role it's very much a partnership role because they know that a lot of what they think about policy wise if it doesn't work for us. It generally doesn't work. And so we spend a lot of going back and forth and and conversation on policy and programatic issues and they say they will pilot things through us in aging that they don't necessarily but to to decide whether the role of matter HOW to form a role that. So. Depends upon what you're talking about but in totality. I would say we have as much influence as we have relationships on the Russian ship is bad. We got no influence relationship is good. We have more influence as you would expect in any kind of relationship is there. Yes Well you know you're like well. I've got thirty nine board members and two thirds of them are electable. But then I like to buy the region their elected by their local governments and then they are selected or by virtue of office they hold a position on our board. So that's part of the accountability and there been some people that say well you've got fifteen citizen members and I have no accountability to to the population. So the electorate but they are the electorate and that's the whole point. There are people who are every day citizens. Some of the business person some of them not some of them work in non-profits some of them retired some of them active some of them older someone younger black white Democrat Republican they represent in large part not necessarily totality they represent a large part of average citizens in the region and so. And so you know I mean I guess at the end of the day the way they get there is because the elected officials on our board choose them and if they felicitous a member is not doing their job they choose somebody else to take their place. So ultimately all of our board members are held accountable to the public by some extension. OK And we have had we have had. Even in recent history of head board members who are elected officials who support regional policy at peril to their local political career and have suffered the price for we had others who have done that and have been reelected with no problems so there is accountability and believe it or not people both back at home so to speak. Pay attention to what they do in the way of their voting and policies they push forward at a.r.c so. This man made a whole lot harder. Jack's question was how was how has the increasing number of units apologies in the region affected our job and has made it more difficult in some respects we try to not we try to we definitely touch base with every city throughout the course of the year and some and some form or fashion either providing advice providing assistance. Whatever else. And so the more we have the more we have to touch base with and that I don't have a staff that grows with the number of cities or grow my staff is essentially the same size it was before only staff that's growing at all is aging and it's largely because of grants not because of basic. Tax dollars local or federal So it's complicated lives very deal and will continue to. Lars you're hired. It's a fair question. It's a very good question. A very relevant question and one that we will be putting in before our board at our retreat next month and I. Clearly the scale of the issues that that we now deal with are regional in nature more often than not twenty years ago you couldn't necessarily say that and certainly forty years ago that wasn't the case issues were primarily local transportation was still very much a local issue and you could build a new road you go whine a row. You could prove an intersection and solve it for your populace. But now we're at a day in age where the overwhelming number of people who work commute at least one county line cross at least one county line to get to work and over a quarter of them cross two county lines certainly were ended a lot more independent water just by very survival of having to to stick together because of two common enemies call Florida out and Alabama most a truth as told that the one thing that helps hold us together we have a common enemy OK you know you have a common enemy or you have a common goal. You know you had the Olympics and you don't want to be embarrassed by comes together side by side and take away your water. We stop all of our border disputes between counties and we work together because now it's an interstate. So I mean you have those external forces that help but on a lot of issues we don't have an external threat or an external opportunity. It's only what we choose to. Craft and make of our own destiny and that's the realisation that a lot of our local elected members are coming to it takes about two years on our board before a board member really begins to figure out what is going on. Because we're so complex and because we deal with so many different things and because it's not their everyday life. It takes them a while to get into the rhythm of understanding what all those acronyms were what all these policies that we do it and to having that eye opening moment when they realize Aha that's where the money for my program comes or that's how we got to do that road. You know it takes a couple years and so it's very frequent the phenomenon of having a new board member by their elected or unelected who comes to the board and they think OK I'm just taking care of my backyard. And within a year they realise I'm in a completely different conversation that I am back in my home government and a couple years is OK now I'm fine I'm going to understand this and now let me engage. It's a pretty predictable cycle of board membership what we hope is that we have them for long enough that once they figure out. Now it's time to engage and I understand it there is are there a lot there long enough to help do something constructively the last two years we've had a third of our board turnover can't turn over a third of your board every two years and they work for Congress. It doesn't work for local planning it's it's hard to get any consistency of policy and thinking that way. So to answer your question which I'm not trying to dodge. We don't have a well thought out. Well articulated strategy for how to coordinate with this increasing fragmentation and that it truly is one of the. Questions that we're going to be putting to our board members at our board retreat next next month because it is a problem that we have to figure out a way to overcome if we're going to make any progress. There are very few metropolitan areas that share the same degree of fragmentation that we have now there are there are a number of other metropolitan areas that have almost as many cities or in that many counties but what they tend to have is a central city that is a more dominant part of the region. So if you take Houston for example. Houston in Harris County together their populations are over sixty's percent of the regions population even though that region is five or six counties and Houston by itself is a third of the population for that reason. So when the mayor and the Council of Houston make a decision they really don't care what the reason thinks the region is going that way. One way of the other OK and they're obviously the dominant economic center. Likewise if you send Harris County agree on something. Well the resi all being dragged along whether you like it or not short of it being in your own backyard. You know whatever it is we talk about. So we have a very small center city for the size population we have you consider the ten county regions four point two three million or something like that and the city of Atlanta is four hundred fifty thousand. OK So we it creates a problem for us. We also have something else in Georgia. That's very different than many other regions in the country and that is and many other states counties have a minimum of respond. It's ability and cities are vested with the primary service delivery for citizens. So like in a place where I grew up Cincinnati the caddy had court system. You know judicial system and had health row a few other things like that but direct service delivery was strickly the city in Ga Ga gave counties years ago the responsibility in the right to do so. Municipal type service delivery to neighborhoods and and residents and despite the increase in cities counties still reserve that power under their charter and so a lot of the fights between new places that want to be cities are places that want to be new cities I should say and counties is the fact that those reticence feel that the county hasn't delivered that municipal service to them in the way they want to is not as responsive as somehow they're trying to rip that power away from that county and that's different in Georgia than is with most other states in the country because most of the states are kind of just don't have that power on charter so. On if I answer your question I talked a long time. There are a lot of cities who do a lot of things well and there's a lot of things that we do. Well the law people learn from from us believe it or not as fragmented as we are we still do a lot of very innovative and creative things that a lot of people the nation learn from I'll give you historical example we used to be the aviation planners for the region before it was even I had it is our aviation department. We were there isn't planners we invented the concept of the parallel runway never had an airfield or an airport in the world. We had a parallel runway. So we created it for what was then Atlanta Municipal Airport. That was needless to say you would even think about flying into an airport any major airport of any size that didn't have parallel runways right. So. Now is a concept. They'll say our program that I've talked about little centers initiative that took federal transportation funds but use them for planning different kinds of communities that brought land use and and transportation closer proximity. It's been a war winning program so much so that the E.P.A. for years used to point to us to other communities that you guys ought to go to Atlanta and learn from them from the L.C.R. program. So you have a lot of other communities that have replicated their program they're given a new name but they replicate their program. They are from us as a lot of things that we do very innovative we in aging we created a program called lifelong communities which we started about four years ago and that's rapidly being immolated by a number of other places around the country we do a lot of innovative things that the general public wouldn't necessarily know about but there's a lot that a lot of other metropolitan areas learn from us but areas that are doing thing well tended to be ones that have simpler regional coordination problems. The Houston's Dallas's Denver's Denver did something twenty years ago that was fairly unique they develop what's called the Mile High compact were basically all the community leaders government. Of all types. Agreed on a set of basic principles about how to grow Denver and what was important. Everything from land use and transportation to arts and they basically use that as a guiding document so generations of elected official. Shows have basically been held to the standard of our you and hearing to the Mile High compact for how we grow. Doesn't control their zoning But it because it's had a lot of success. It's kind of the expectation that you're trying to help your community be a part of the greater Denver area by adhering to the principles and the goals of my compact we've never done anything like that here. So. Yeah I mean you know what I'd say yes OK let's look at and what I mean by that is that the commission staff and board often have a vision of the possibilities of opportunity and the possibilities of problems and we try to preach that historically though whether people listen to that and we acted to it or acted accordingly. Has been and even now. Very recently we have decided to take a different stance and in two thousand and eleven as a part of their And you're treated that year our board said we want the region. The agency to become a regional leader on issues and not just a plan but they didn't say how we do that. They just set the framework for a strategic plan a set. We need to be more proactive and act as a leader on regional issues and then they waited till the new executive director walk and say what now. Give us a template for how we go about. And that. And so last year. Well actually late October late two thousand and twelve that we began putting into place last year I developed a strategy we call the evolution strategy which basically is changing our culture and our mindset to not just merely do great planning and services but to harness the power of relationships and hardness our technical expertise to do and if I collisions of action on pushing through certain things and so we're moving to a more proactive mindset to address things so they answer your question is yes we're both OK You know I'm here so I'm you know this is one station. To shape. Society and in every way. I mean let's think about it cannot. And I mean the problems of global climate change. So they're big and if you or anyone coming from Europe. COMPERE I mean this style of living is don't leave completely right. But you put a comparison like that to that very radically different vision of how people should get to work home people you want people to do things so that the normative issues kind of so having a vision is one thing but how to help. So what would be your vision. If you think try to think about this question very long as my vision personally or my vision representing that agency where you know I have to be very careful when I respond that I don't put my personal opinion in front of the agency without declaring whether it is or not my personal opinion. OK So in response to your question yes we could have a very we could have a vision a very radically alters how the region changes. But it has no power. If the region doesn't want to go there because at the end of the day we represent a collective voice a collective political voice. And that political voice has to be willing to try to aspire to that vision and sell that to its electorate. Otherwise it's just on paper and it means nothing. And that's what we're trying to get away from is just being something on paper but thinking that's being more actively engaged in terms of our aspirations as a region. So so now what do I see what do we think collectively as an agency was things that that we have adopted coming out of the failure of the referendum transpiration referendum is that we have to get our community leadership and hopefully the residents understanding that the world has dramatically changed in terms of global economic competitiveness. And so we've been preaching the fact that the world has been changed and this is how it's changing we lay out the case for why we believe it's change and with that in mind here are some things that we have to think differently if we're going to remain a vibrant. Competitive top tier world city we've only recently emerged on to the West world stage. You know Berlin what hundreds of years old London hundreds of years thousands of years old for that matter Beijing. You know because of size even though it's just recently emerged as an economic power because of pure size. It's automatically a major player on the world stage at last emerged after the Olympics. Through a lot of sheer will and gutsiness and chutzpah. You know. But we have ability to stay here and get stronger if we think and coordinate and act on some fundamental things. So that's what we're trying to get the region to adopt now is a vision for how do we remain a. Major economic power and the global stage not just in the southeast. What kinds of things that we have to do to get there. One of the things that's very obvious to us that we're now part of a collective community planning and conversation about is we've gotten by yours on having a bad K. through twelve public school system. Why because we largely imported talent that we needed. That doesn't formulas and work anymore it's not going to suffice for what we need to grow and be a strong economic region. We have to find a way to get our public education system working more effectively for giving young people the skills to go to career or go on to university also connected to education in different way. We have to find a better way to align the people coming out of university with the skills that workers. I mean with employers are demanding in two thousand and twelve me twenty eleven near the depth of the recession we're coming out. Still we had three point six job openings for every unemployed person in the region over three to have jobs available job opens available for every unemployed person the reason regardless of what your education was for every unemployed person with a bachelor's degree. We had one point six job openings skills alignment what people had learned in university training it was not what people were asking for as employers. So we have to do a better job of aligning with a Jew a better job of preparing people in public schools. It will be critical twenty years thirty years for our future as a region because we won't be able to keep importing young talent people to go from other places. Just hear. Mayors right yet like. Here. It's a it's a fair question. I don't mind answering it. I don't have a good answer for you. Only because I don't know the politics of the Gwinnett mayor's well enough to be able to scribe what happened. I can't know Bucky a snow Cross is going to yeah but what I can tell you is that I do know it had to do with the politics of the mayors in Gwinnett and not with the regional stance. OK that's not what it was then yes no no no I can tell you that former Fayette County chairman Jack Smith. Jack was clearly an elected in part because of his strong stance of trying to orient fare toward the region because Fayette for years has tried to a lot of his electorate have been reluctant to being identified and working cooperatively with the rest of the region. And Jack was one of those board members I came on a couple years later is like a ha. I get it and you know we do need to be part of this region and a lot of ways because whether we like it or not we are and he got elected in large part because of the. Because his opponent use that to hammer him over the head with that was before the referendum former Henry County Commission Chairman B.J. Hinrich there were some local issues and whether they're right or robber there were some local issues that were brought into her campaign but one of the things her opponent use against There was a fact that she stood for the transportation referendum which had failed by that time and that she was actively engaged with that she was and she paid a price for it but Bucky's election. An election to the board of a R.C. had more to do with local politics amongst the good net mayors and had to do with anything espoused on air or sea board. I'm sorry. Yeah if you guys need to leave. Feel free but I can stay is as long as they did this my last point before the days on a matter disposed. OK. They may not want to be the next of the sucker but but fair no question Jane. I will I will confirm that my observation is that there are not there are very few Georgia Tech alarms who are in elected community leadership a lot of them in business and some in city so they say we show up most frequently in business leadership a little less frequently and civic leadership and then very infrequently an elected community leadership. I think part of that is that that most Tech students. Come to get an education and look forward to a career solving problems that aren't necessarily political or community based problems as much as more. Systems and human systems interface kinds of problems which are not careers and naturally lead to politics as opposed to people study political science or history or whatever else that might choose because of the human action to get more into politics and community. What do we do to encourage them. More I think by and large I wish I could get every Tech student to do a survey course on policy in society. Technical policy and society or technology and society because more and more. The decisions that we render as technical leaders the things that we aim for as technical leaders and workers affect the the fabric of community and effects it more dramatically and faster than at any point in time in human history and there's always an ethical component that goes in that you know where you have defects in large numbers of people because of technical decisions is no longer purely a technical decision to how the technology view it gets to be a societal decision to how it's use when it's used how to apply where it's applied in the rules of engagement of technology and often because the technology can go so much faster than the human systems can catch up to it. The judicial systems are ethics the whole sense of what's appropriate lags well behind the application of technology and then the genie is out of the bottle and we're trying to figure out how to corral it we can't put it back in and I wish. Tech students would understand that basic principle to the point that they would realize that even if they choose to have technical rears or go on to have technical careers they still have a duty of care in their community to be engaged in debate around the application of technical technology and community. Miss what is done for anyway even technology's done for commerce ultimately comes back to community so but if you don't go into your career with us thinking about that is something you wake up and you come across made career later in career and then you say I well do I gauge or do I not engage and how do I engage if I. When engaged and by that time I don't know where to start and I'm kind of hunting and seeking I think a survey course and something like that. What not that you can make that happen. Dr cousins maybe make them a bit but I think exposing students to that those basic questions. Early on in life as they mature as adults and mature in their careers. I think they become more aware of it from the very beginning of life and adulthood and then they may choose to engage more. But it's got to be their choice but I think part of their lack of choice is lack of exposure. But that's the Doug hooker come by our question and response. So.