September 16, 2009MPO REFORM: A NATIONAL AGENDA FOR REFORMING METROPOLITAN GOVERNANCE

Metropolitan governance needs to be reformed. The nation’s economic crisis is also the crisis of its metropolitan areas. Producers of 90 percent of the nation’s economic output and home to 80 percent of its population, metropolitan areas across the nation are struggling to cope with the recent crisis. Outdated metropolitan political structures are an important part of the problem. Highly fragmented governance systems contribute to increasing sprawl and congestion, growing racial and economic segregation, and deepening disparities in the quality of local services. Reforming metropolitan governance is essential for fair and sustainable national growth. Political fragmentation of metropolitan areas is harmful. The harms of political fragmentation are many and related. Fragmented political systems encourage inefficient competition among local jurisdictions, a process that often leads to socially and economically undesirable policies. Cities steal malls and office parks from each other, fight tax incentive wars for auto malls, and zone out the poor for fiscal advantage in a process rife with haphazard planning and NIMBY biases. This disjointed