Leading a City … With Jokes

About this episode

The episode discusses the importance of leading a city with joy and finesse, featuring insights from former mayors and a current mayor.

This special episode was recorded live at The Philadelphia Citizen's eighth annual Ideas We Should Steal Festival presented by Comcast NBCUniversal. Our hosts, former Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter, former Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and Citizen Media Group President and CEO Larry Platt were joined on stage by a return guest, five-term Rochester Hills, Michigan Mayor Bryan Barnett, a Republican. Barnett is a consummate showman, as evidenced by his increasingly elaborate State of the City addresses (full-scale musical productions). Here, Barnett and the hosts discuss the importance of leading a city with joy and finesse, and how the Democratic party is fumbling the ball — in messaging and in the recent government shutdown. As Mayor Barnett points out, there really is no Republican or Democrat way to fill a pothole. You just fill the pothole. "The moment you put your foot on the sidewalk," Nutter responded, "people are looking to see how's the mayor doing? Is the city upbeat? Is it grumpy? There's a public impact to this job." Join us as we dive back into Rochester Hills with Mayor Barnett and explore how to really run a city with style and good humor. Remember to subscribe to the…

People in this episode

Hosts: Michael Nutter, Kasim Reed, Larry Platt

Guest: Bryan Barnett

Topics covered

• city leadership
• politics
• humor in governance
• government shutdown
• public perception

Keywords

• city leadership
• government shutdown
• public perception
• humor in politics
• Rochester Hills

Sponsors

Comcast NBCUniversal

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: The Philadelphia Citizen

Places: Rochester Hills, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Michigan

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