1. Eliminate Insecurity. Eliminate the inferiority complex. For example, when someone in Sacramento says City, we all think they are talking about San Francisco, not Sacramento. Mr. Ezell suggested we need to think of Sacramento as being 'on the cusp of greatness'. He mentioned Austin, TX is known as the 'It' City. In his opinion it's no better than Sacramento, but locals talk it up. Recently, Austin's Mayor announced that Austin has the best downtown in the United States. Which brought him to his second piece of advice.
2. Proclaim yourself a Big City.
and next
3. Energize. Make sure that all new development projects bring energy to the streets.
and finally
4. Employ urbanology, which the Merriem-Webster dictionary defines as a study dealing with specialized problems of cities (as planning, education, sociology, and politics)

He suggests that we should rejoice in every crane we see. It's a mark of progress. He introduced the audience to Exurbs, an area where people live even more remote that Suburbs. As people 'escaped' to the suburbs, and now the exurbs, downtowns are challenged.

And back to point 1. Mr. Ezell, who travels extensively to urban areas had no idea that Sacramento was so cool. He contends we are not on the national radar.

Kyle Ezell is working on his next book Retire Downtown.

Watch this space for more on the State of Downtown breakfast and all of the grand plans that were unveiled. It's exciting times in Sacramento. Let's start telling ourselves and, even better, others.

Gillian Parrillo
The Sacramento Executive