[bouldercouncilhotline] Hotline: NLC update from Matt

[cmosupport at bouldercolorado.gov]

Sender: Appelbaum, Matt

Colleagues - The second of my updates, this one on NLC, the National League of Cities.

NLC held its annual fall conference in Nashville in November.  I currently serve on the NLC Executive Board, having been elected in November, 2014; my term ends next November, when I'll figure out if it makes sense to run for a final term or return to one of the policy committees.

I previously served on the steering committee of the Energy, Environment, and Natural Resources (EENR) Policy Committee, and was also its chair and vice-chair.  I still attend EENR's meetings when I can.  I'm also on the steering committee of the University Communities Council (UCC).  Both of these groups held meetings during the conference.

The NLC Board was recently expanded in size...to the point that the full Board really doesn't do all that much since it's too big.  Several of us have been quite unhappy about that, and also about some changes that have been made regarding the policy committees; that debate continues and I'm quite involved.  There is now an executive committee that really does all of the work, and thankfully one of my best friends will be on it next year; I'd like to get on it the following year if possible.  Key to NLC is the leadership, which in 2015 included Mayor Becker of Salt Lake City as a terrific president; Ralph is a good friend (who of course was also at the COP21), although he very unfortunately was just defeated in his reelection as mayor.  The current president is Councilmember Colbert Kean from Joplin, MO, whom I know fairly well.  Next in line, for 2017, is a very good friend of mine from Cleveland, and following him (since he was selected as 2nd VP at this meeting, thankfully) is another very good friend from Little Rock.

The Board does have several committees, and thankfully I'm on the legislative committee, which considers the lobbying activities of NLC.  Nothing surprising to report here, and in fact NLC's priorities continue to be appropriate, including "marketplace fairness" (collecting local sales taxes on shipped/Internet purchases), passage of a transportation bill (which miraculously happened, imperfect though it may be), protection of municipal bonds, etc. (see www.nlc.org<http://www.nlc.org> for more details).  Board members also serve on the Resolutions Committee, which examines all of the proposed changes to NLC policy and recommended resolutions (one-year actions that guide NLC lobbying efforts) that come from the various policy committees.

All of the policy changes and resolutions are voted on by the members in attendance at the business meeting.  While this is usually non-controversial, there have been several times - most recently all involving EENR actions, with me representing EENR - when there have been serious battles that went to member votes.  This year there were some complaints, and in particular an attempt by a few to rescind an EENR resolution relating to climate change.  I and several other former EENR members spoke up for the resolution, and it was handily supported.

Given the numerous meetings I need to attend, I don't get to nearly as many conference sessions as I should.  I did accept, on behalf of the city and along with a member of our IT staff, an award for best website from the Digital Cities Survey; we've won this before, this year getting second place in our size category.  I also - much to my amazement - was presented with the official of the year award from the Democratic Municipal Officials (DMO), which I've reported on previously.

As for the sessions, only a couple of things still stick out in my mind.  First, at the closing general session the keynote speaker was Vice President Biden.  He gave a rather interesting and often amusing talk, ending with a very strong statement on climate change and why it is essential to take significant action now - it was very well presented, I thought, and good for the NLC members to hear.  And we got a most unexpected mention when Biden noted the work of cities and the importance of the Compact of Mayors, and then commended three cities for their efforts, beginning with Boulder!

The one panel session worth mentioning was on the so-called sharing economy.  NLC had a similar session at their spring conference with Uber and Airbnb, so this one had representatives from two smaller companies, one dealing with food and the other with "pop-up" retail.  There was an excellent moderator from a tech journal who kept things interesting.  The key take-aways, as with Uber and Airbnb, is that these companies have no intention of playing by the rules, and really don't believe in any rules.  They simply do what they want, hope to build up a sufficient customer base, and then effectively force cities to allow them to stay.  To be fair, they also note that they must move quickly, while cities get endlessly bogged down in "process"; indeed, we're all going to need to move more quickly as these inventive but often rather odd business models keep appearing.

Not surprisingly, the audience was more than a little hostile.  I didn't think this was simply because rules were being broken, or that these business models were thought to be inappropriate.  It was more the gleeful ignore-the-rules style and, frankly, the arrogance.  As one example, since food was being sold by one company, there was a reasonable question about food safety; the response was that bad reviews would fix any problems, so government didn't need to get involved!  There were similar questions about insurance, zoning, impacts, taxes, etc., and in all cases the response was that the businesses knew what was best and it would all get sorted out eventually by customer reviews.  And there was also a lot of push-back by city folks against the claim that the sharing economy was great for employees...er, independent contractors who used the services; as you probably know, that battle is just beginning.  I'm sure a session like this will be a regular at NLC conferences (and CML as well) since the industry and the debates are in their infancy.

Finally, some thoughts on Boulder's representation at NLC.  I've been at NLC for the past seven years, I think, with the understanding that it only made sense to go to the conferences if I was actively involved, hence my work at EENR, UCC, and now the Board.  Macon served on the Transportation and Infrastructure Services (TIS) Policy Committee for a while.  NLC naturally moves rather slowly given its size and membership, but, as with CML, almost always supports legislative actions that Boulder also supports, and opposes those we oppose.  Of course, dealing with Congress is largely hopeless, but there is always much to be done with the administration and executive agencies.  And of course we'd often like NLC (and CML) to fight harder for some of our priorities.

I hope to remain active at NLC for the next couple of years, whether on the Board or back on a policy committee.  I think it would be good if another councilmember became active, if not next year then certainly in 2017 so that I could make introductions to all the key people.  Besides the time commitment - two multi-day conferences plus a summer meeting for all policy committees - there is of course the cost of travel and conference registration.  And any of us are of course welcome to attend an NLC conference, although as I noted I don't think it makes sense to do so regularly without getting on a committee (which I can almost certainly arrange).  There are currently seven policy committees - you can see them all at the NLC web site - although it is possible some will be combined.

--Matt