The Brookings Metropolitan Council Visits Erie to Discuss the Importance of Advanced Industries
After the Erie County Gaming Revenue and the Jefferson Educational Society became a part of the Brookings Metropolitan Leadership Council and the Chairman's Circle of the Brookings Council, a team from the Metropolitan Council will make it inaugural visit to Erie over a two-day period. At this event, Vice President of the Metropolitan Policy Program, Bruce Katz, and Senior Fellow, Mark Muro, will discuss the importance of a collaboration in advance industries in a prospering region.
Bruce J. Katz is the co-author (with Jeremy Nowak) of The New Localism: How Cities Can
Thrive in the Age of Populism and (with Jennifer Bradley) of The Metropolitan Revolution:
How Cities and Metros are Fixing Our Broken Politics and Fragile Economy. Both books
explain why cities and their networks have emerged as the world’s leading problem-solvers.
Katz’s experience extends to policy-making at the national level, as well. He was chief of staff
for U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros during the Clinton
administration and was the senior counsel and then staff director for the U.S. Senate
Subcommittee on Housing and Urban Affairs. After the 2008 presidential election, he co-led
the housing and urban development transition team for the Obama administration and served
as a senior advisor to the new Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Secretary Shaun
Donovan, for the first 100 days of that administration.
Katz left government employment to join the Brookings Institute as vice president and
founding director of the Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program. From 2016-2018 he was the
Institute’s first Centennial Scholar, focusing his research on the challenges and opportunities
of global urbanization.
He is now a Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Lindy Institute for Urban Innovation and the
co-founder and inaugural director of the Nowak Metro Finance Lab. Also a visiting professor
at the London School of Economics, he regularly advises global, national, state, regional and
municipal leaders on public reforms and private innovations that advance the well-being of
metropolitan areas and their countries.
In 2006, Katz received the prestigious Heinz Award in Public Policy for his contributions to
understanding the “function and values of cities and metropolitan areas and profoundly
influencing their economic vitality, livability and sustainability.” He is a graduate of Brown
University and Yale Law School.
