walking into a tough situation, but after meeting with you and watching you here today, i sense in you the ability to bring people together. i know that you have to do that a lot. i think it is necessary. i hope, as a long-time member of this commission, despite my opposition, i know you will be confirmed to this. i hope you'll do your best to help our new chairman find her way. if there is disagreement, let's not make it personal. let's not make it a vendetta. this is bring those disagreements out and recognize that is how this country is.

we are great because we allow that debate. we can go out for a cup of coffee afterwards. i am very pleased you're both here today, that we have such an important hearing. that it was so simple. i am just feeling good today. thank you very much. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> one thing that was exceptionally inspiring is what is the magnitude of difference of life and what will pale in

comparison? >> someone from the white house came and said that those who think they are crazy enough to change the world are the ones who actually do. >> the same and the christopher is talking about said choose carefully and execute relentlessly. that meant a lot to me because too many times we find ourselves taking too much time and not focusing on the one thing that should be a top priority. >> every year students come to washington for a week of leadership. this year, he made an impact as a senior director on the national security staff. >> i started on the mind set of what is it like to be them? and now that i'm in this role, what can i share with them that i wished i had known along the way? or that they will remember which, as you mentioned, is a very intense, rapid-fire

experience. if you leave a few key messages it is a good thing to encourage young people to pursue public service. >> more with brian kamoie on c- span. >> on wednesday, officials from denver and pittsburgh discuss their strategies for creating economic growth. they focused on education, collaborating with the business community, and invested in growth industries. it is part of the annual jobs summit in washington. this is about 50 minutes. >> good afternoon, everyone. if you'll be so kind as to take your seats, we will move on with our program. in the executive vice president

for foreign policy innovation. i am sitting in as a poor substitute resolve with the governors still doing an interview. it is my pleasure to introduce to you one of the chamber's foundations who will be a moderating the next panel. nick has conducted original research on high field immigration and its importance to america's economic competitiveness. he is the dewitt wallace fellow at the american enterprise institute. he specializes in political, economic, and technology research. is the editor in chief focusing on business, economics, and public affairs. but he also co-authored a group

called from poverty to prosperity. this work is on the list of books that drives the free enterprise debate. he is already made an important contribution, but most importantly his critical thinking, credible research are contributed to the national economic debate. please join me in welcoming nick. >> welcome everyone to this panel. as he mentioned, i worked at the american enterprise institute. a lot of times the discussions can be -- one of the things that i like about what they do but

also the slope that we're going to do with cities is looking at a granular level and what practitioners are doing on the ground. it is incredibly important to do this. when we actually look at cities that face challenges and take steps to rise and meet those challenges. with two good examples in pittsburgh and denver. they're two of my favorite cities. you should have on the table in front of you this study right here which is an outgrowth.

i want to give you a couple of highlights. about one percentage point higher than recent years, which is pretty remarkable. one of the things the report highlights is the importance of cities thinking about how to create jobs and economic opportunity, and understanding what your strengths are. there is a temptation to say we need jobs and we need dynamism, and economic activity, so let's try to be like silicon valley. a lot of times that does not work.

they will see the movie industry has been important for los angeles. maybe we can get movies made here. it does not look at what is really innate and specific to a city itself then try to leverage that, but pittsburgh and denver are good examples of cities that have done that, looking at their own strengths, and have said how can we go on this? both cities are known for a tradition of manufacturing. there is a perception, and i think it is a false one, that manufacturing is in decline in this country. my colleague, and ncf fellow has done research on this. there is a boom if you look at an advanced manufacturing. the spurt in denver are good

examples of cities that have looked -- pittsburgh and denver are good examples of cities that have looked to their roots. another example is both cities harness the potential of the new energy boom that is going on -- natural-gas and a light. some of the governors were saying they were fortunate to be sitting on top of these energy reserves, but as my friend who spoke to earlier, plenty of states are sitting on top of enormous energy deposits and not doing anything about it. this is where business and political leadership really matters. denver and pittsburgh are examples of cities taking advantage of the national research -- natural resource endowments may have. those are areas where they have something in common, but one area denver has leveraged strength is trade. it is a traditional crossroads. it is built on that tradition to leverage international trade,

and exports are up 70% since 2005. pittsburgh has had a tradition of higher education both with great research universities like carnegie-mellon, the university of pittsburgh medical center and the like, and it has leveraged those assets to become a real leader in things like health care, robotics, information technology and the like. it is important to think about that when trying to draw lessons for other states and communities. we will have a conversation. you should have pieces of white paper on your table. i ask the you write down questions. we will start to my right, your left, and we will go down in here about two or three minutes, an overview from our

panelists. the first is the honorable michael hancock, the mayor of denver. i will turn it over to mayor michael hancock. >> thank you. i want to thank you to the u.s. chamber for this invitation. if you look at denver and identify the words that describe our positioning, and the things that we have done over the years that have helped to sustain and ignite growth over these turbulent years, words like regionalism, partnership, particularly public/private, with my friend and colleague to the left, kelly broke, as well as with other companies, and collaborations'. these are words that really solidified our city going forward. i will give you a hint of what i'm talking about. 154 years ago denver was considered to dead to barry.

that is a direct statement from an economic development leader. when they started running trains, denver realized it connected to shy and with a train, it could create an economic opportunity as a city. fast forward to the new change in transportation where air became the more dominant form for people to move around the united states. in denver, visionaries have the foresight to open up the international airport. it did not take long before it became the most dominant form of commerce for the city of denver. when the economy began to settle again, a visionary said let's build a new airport. we have become stifled.

again, in difficult times denver responded by building denver international airport. as a result, the city began to take this journey to what i love governor herbert said -- beginning to embrace the global market. i ride in 2011 as the new mayor and we looked -- i arrived in 2011 as the new mayor and we looked at new agencies -- industries that began to embraced globalization. we will be most successful if we do a few things. number one is embraced the global market. two, worked on investing locally, which means we have to educate the workforce, make sure we are investing in leveraging those emerging markets in the global economy, thereby having a reason why someone would want to come to your city, and why we want to go globally. thirdly, invest in our infrastructure, which denver has done over the years to build what i believe the most vibrant downtown in denver.

as a result, you have companies wanting to relocate. yeah massive investment in the transit system. as a result we are the number one destination for 18-to-34- year-old's in the nation. they're coming to denver in droves, creating a new base for us. we have begun to take a look how we can use them leverage our position as a city in the midi -- in the middle of the nation, where you can get anywhere in the world between two and 12 hours. the last thing i will say to you is through the investment of our infrastructure, is at the height of our recession, our then-mayor led the effort to invest in infrastructure that the tool of a half of $1 billion bond issue, and as we begin to emerge in denver is sitting as the number 1 city for the

creation of construction jobs. we have been building investments even during these economic challenges. that vibrancy is beginning to attract more businesses and opportunities to our city and it is an awesome toll for me to use as i try to grow the city for job creation. >> kelly brough, director of the chamber of commerce for denver. >> thank you. great to be here. in colorado, the huge benefit is the history of this country is if you set out a body of water chances were good you could find your way toward success economically and technology has changed that and position us, where in land to find our place in the world -- warwick england to find our place in the world. -- who are inladn. two places where we have been

lucky and good is the development of the workforce. we are the second most educated state in the country. we are lucky because people want to move there because of the quality of life and what we deliver, and the second is we are willing to acknowledge some of our weaknesses, graduating our own kids and preparing them to be the work force we want. our willingness to call out where we are not as strong has been a huge advantage for us. we tend to do it early and we do it with great vigor. the second thing is our business climate and recognition. also, we did not have a history of needing to build our economy the way many cities have. we did not know you needed to ask things like what is your family name, where did you go to school?

we skipped those questions and went straight to do you want to contribute, and how can you get involved? i would say that attitude was our competitive edge as position does very well as we go into this next, kind of, economic future. i look forward to the discussions we are about to get into. >> now, you would expect the mayor of the city and someone with the chamber to be boosters, but we also have chris riva paul, senior vice president -- chris while pell -- riopelle. >> a little bit about us first. we are a large health-care company focused on the dialysis

space, but recently have expanded to a broader part of health care. we are delighted to call denver home. about three years ago, we announced our decision to relocate from california to colorado, and we have done that. in about one month, we will moving toward new headquarters in a special part of downtown denver. davita cares for 140,000 people in 27 locations across america we are delighted that denver is home. we will talk more about why we made that decision. there are a lot of factors that went into it.

suffice to say we believed we moved into a community that would embraces and support us in many ways and the state of colorado at out-perform significantly in that regard. i am delighted to be here and part of the discussion. >> thank you. now, we will flip to the other side of the country and go to pittsburgh. kelly mentioned how important the it was to be on a body of water. pittsburgh is not on one, but three. first, we will hear from the hon. which fitzgerald, -- rich fitzgerald. >> thank you. i want to say thank you to the chamber for having us and for recognizing the success that the sprint has become over the last couple of years. when the industrial hit happened in the late-1970's and early-1980's, we probably suffered more than anyone with job loss and a population loss and it has taken us many years to find a solution, and if i have -- would have to synthesize our success, in a few words it

would be cooperation and diversity. we have a lot of cooperation amongst institutions, government working with business and government, with our universities, as we have nine major universities working together. they worked with the government sector and with business to partner. i would also add in our labor unions. they have been terrific partners with us in providing the type of partnership and work-force development that i hear about all of the time. i heard the governors previously talk about bad being one of the barriers. we see the same thing. we have a lot of jobs available, not necessarily high-skilled jobs, although we do have

those, too, 1500 engineering jobs in the city of pittsburgh not filled, the we also have jobs for technicians, welders, machinists. there is a great speed to of cooperation as the work force cooperates with management to make them more efficient, competitive, and make better and more marketable products. so, what we have been able to do over the past few years has really been leading the nation. our gdp has been about 5.5% while the nation has been about 1.82%. housing values have also led the nation in appreciation as we have seen jobs grow in a variety of areas. again, when i talk about diversity, obviously we used to be known for steel and heavy manufacturing. we still make a lot of steel. our housing values over the last

five years have led the nation and appreciation. as we have seen jobs grow in a variety of areas. when i talk about diversity, we used to be known for steel and heavy manufacturing. we still make a lot of steel, of what has changed in steel, it is much more automated. we have had major investment in our stainless steel mills. we have a burgeoning chemical industry. we also have a burgeoning i.t. business. we are one of the major rail institutes, making the cars and the switches for people movers of the world. we have, again, a very diverse economy. one of the things i would really highlight of the change of the 30 years that i talked about is, 30 years ago, or 25-35-year-old work force was one of the least educated in america. fast forward to 30 years later, or 25-35-year-old work force is the highest indicated in the country when it comes to postgraduate degrees. that has been a major transformation as we continue to invest in education and invest in our workers and the folks that are there. we continue to work on

attracting talent, quality of life issues that have really made a great difference in our region. >> thank you, rich. next up is dennis, the ceo of the allegheny conference on community development. >> good afternoon, everybody. if you don't what the allegheny conference is, we are the metro chamber organization that represents the private sector and reduce private-sector in the area. for someone who grew up in pittsburg, being here today is amazing. if you go back 30 years, 1983, our low point, the regional unemployment rate was 18.3%. him about that for a minute. today it is 6.7% and dropping. the real fundamental question we want to talk to you about today is how?

what happened? what did pittsburg do? finally there are three things that were done over 30 years persistently, and asked the county executive said, with collaboration. one, we did not stop doing what we are good at, which was making things, financing and, and providing the energy needed to operate it. the three industries have been reinvented through innovation. we levered world-class universe in health care institutions and the billion dollars a year of research is done there to create knowledge that did not exist 30 years ago. software, robotics, medical devices, etc., and today there are over 1600 technology companies in the region. third, we invested in the place. we became the most livable city in america the last four years in a row. we invest in air, water, riverfront, housing, education,

recreation, etc.. for those who have never been to pittsburg art not in the last 10 years, i guarantee you'll be shocked if you come and visit the place. as a result we are here today, invited to this discussion, and we are stunned and proud. >> next up is gregg, president and ceo of the bayer corp. usa and the chair of the greater pittsburgh chamber of commerce. it is good to have you with us. >> thanks everyone for coming today. we have three businesses, one which you probably recognize from the product that maybe it took this morning, bayer aspirin. the health-care business

develops products that help to diagnose and cure and prevent disease. we also have a large signs business which really focuses on enhancing crop yields as well as securing the food supply, and finally we have a material size business which is a high-tech polymer business that applies and develops and does research in the application of these materials to improve energy efficiency, to improve security, as well as to make our everyday lives simpler. unlike chris, we are not newcomers to pittsburg. this bird has been our headquarters for over 50 years now. we started there with a handful of people and one building and have grown up with the city

through that time to 2700 employees in the pittsburgh area. we have more than 50 sites across the country. i have 13,000 employees in the united states across those 50 sites. 2700 of those sit at pittsburg and not only are they doing headquarters work but also doing basic research and medical devices and high-tech polymers. we have stayed for over 50 years in pittsburgh because of the tremendous work ethic, because of the universities. i mentioned we do basic research there so the universities are critical to bayer science for better life. that is our tagline. innovation is everything that we do, and pittsburg is a great place to innovate. >> remember, you have pieces of paper on your table, so we encourage you to write down

questions and submit them. i want to draw together couple of bread, some things that i was hearing from all the participants. one is the importance of workforce to the success of the area. this is something tom talked about in his remarks in terms of human capital. when you think about that, about the work force issue, tom mentioned immigration. bringing in people who can do the jobs that are necessary. another is trying to develop the work force that is already there. what are things the city can do to try to improve the work force situation so that businesses are attracted, so that businesses can grow organically that are already there? >> first and foremost, working closely with the school system to make sure there is zero tolerance in the community for failing schools are failing systems.

we have been working to improve on that. we have created the education compact which brought together in the private sector, higher education partners to help us define ways and actionable goals that we can make an impact on. it started a few years before that when -- part of the sales tax goes to ensure that every 4- year-old in denver can go to preschool or an early childhood education program. we believe if we are going to build a strong work force, it starts with the very young. making sure that our school ready when they enter kindergarten at age 5. we know they enter kindergarten prepared and ready to hit the ground running. they are typically reading -- the first third grade class just left class and 30% of the kids for the first time were tested proficient at the grade level or above.

that far outpaces the kids who did not go through our program in denver. so we are making a commitment through the whole pipeline to make sure our kids are school ready and proficient at third grade reading and that they are graduating. that is a signal to our private sector partners that we are committed to build a strong work force. >> that has to be music to mark critz fourier's right there. what are some other things? >> as i go around on a daily basis as an economic development director, the one thing i hear about its work

force level, that is the number- one issue by far. one of the things we try to do is partner -- being whatever or customers need to get them the help they need and what they need typically its work force training. we have developed a committee system that is very flexible in the curriculum we provide with our partners. if there is a need for companies to have welders, we have a wheldon program at one of our community college campuses. whatever it might be. we have a burgeoning energy industry in western pennsylvania and allegheny county. there has been a great influx and growth in people in those jobs, but they need to be trained to work on a natural gas rick in the controls and testing and need to be done. we try to provide our community college and work with our universities to try to provide

-- meet those needs. as i mentioned before, our trade unions have some of the best training facilities in the country to bring people along. >> on the community college front, are you going out to the companies, or are they coming to you? how does it work so you are developing a curriculum for the next five or 10 years? >> a little bit of both. many of our companies stock about the fact that they will be hiring 30 workers a year for the next five years. we find out what they need. it really goes both ways. they often bring it to us and we go out and talk to them. >> a question from the audience about small business. a lot of cities in metro's think it is really important to attract a big company to move up a huge base of operations into their area.

but there is another way of looking at it, which is focusing on small business. maybe we can start with dennis and the others can chime in. how do you think about small business as a focus for creating jobs and pittsburg and the surrounding area? >> the question highlights a very important point. the attractions from our region get the most publicity, but in any healthy economy, 9% of the dogs will be created either by new start-ups or by existing companies that are expanding. attractions are important, too, but they will never dominate the economy. if you are not focused on small and medium businesses which create most of the jobs in america, you are going to have a problem. maybe the most noteworthy in our case is we have this billion dollar a year research set of institutions that are doing all this world-class research. we have worked hard over the last 30 years to commercialize more and more of that research. that involves universities, active participation, policies

and operation that involves early stage places, incubators for companies can get started and be nurtured bid involves early stage risk capital an angel capital to be able to finance these businesses. we work very hard in a public- private way, state, local governments, businesses and the private sector involvement to try to make that work. >> what about you guys, the focus on small business? >> 90% of our businesses have less than 100 employees. the federal government defines small as less than 500. for us, that is the. a huge part of our strategy is around how to help those businesses be successful and higher and drive jobs and ensure they can grow in colorado. we are the fourth state in the country to have one employee organizations.

that means one person who works for the company. we are the fourth largest number of all states in terms of the number of those we have. during the recession, one of the things we looked into is why is that? we believe because we have a more educated work force, what tended to happen is people who might lose a job tend to start their own business and take that job. we think creating an environment that allows people to take a risk and have the work force with the capacity to do it can make all the difference, and ensure you have less unemployment as well. >> an excellent question here from someone in the audience who points out that both pittsburg in denver have posted major events in recent years. pittsburg at a g-20 summit in denver had the democratic convention. most of the both of those things cost a lot of money to put on. the person is wondering about the costs and disruptions of the

city. how should other cities think about these things? >> we were very proud that president obama picked pittsburg to host the g-20 a couple of years ago, talking about cities that had transformed themselves. it was one of the first examples of what we were. were the things the president was talking about was sustainability in energy efficiency and green. we have really embraced green in our city. our convention center is the highest certification that there is. it draws a lot of people. there is a lot of tourism dollars, a lot of conventions that want to be socially responsible. they come to pittsburgh because we have the most sustainable, the greenest convention center. we talked about the financial sector. pnc is one of the biggest banks in the world and they are

building a $400 million skyscraper in downtown pittsburgh. there was inconvenience, but our folks were willing to do that because we were so proud that the world was coming to our city, to our region. we wanted to show it off, so we were willing to put up with some of the inconvenience that comes with the security of hosting the world leaders. there was a cost to it, but i think the benefits far outweigh that because it enabled us to show of our city, to talk about some of the things that we have, and it did attract some businesses so we are able to gain from that. >>, pittsburg perspective as well. his point is exactly right, and

has put a very positive spotlight, when you have looked at what has happened since the g-20 in pittsburg. the following year, we are able to attract the united nations environment program to select pittsburg as the host city in the united states for world environment day. this particular year, we are the host city for one young world, which is the davos of the younger generation. we are looking at thousands of young, potential employees who are migrants and to pittsburg who will be in pittsburg-you are talking about some very big issues. you can leverage these as well and a very intelligent way. rich and the entire team, each one of these come back to the point about public-private partnerships, each one has a partnership associated with it

where the private sector is equally engaged with the public sector. >> you cannot pay for the kind of marketing and exposure that your city gets from hosting the sort of events. for four or five days, denver was the focal point of the entire world. it was a major party convention. you just simply cannot put a dollar figure on the kind of exposure that occurs. right after the convention, i used to say the good news is that everyone knows about denver now. the bad news is, everyone knows about denver now. the second thing is, i could not have been prouder of the regional cooperation that emerged as part of the planning, execution of the convention. to walk around denver during that time and to see police

officers from all over the metro region proud to represent the metro region to the world, was extremely gratifying to watch. to walk around denver during that time and to see police officers from all over the metro region proud to represent the metro region to the world, was extremely gratifying to watch. finally, the multiplier of what occurred, as a result today we are reaping the benefits. denver is one of the top convention destinations of the world. people are coming. we are sold out for years. we have minimal time on the calendar because of the number of conventions coming to denver. you can trace that directly back to the convention being in denver and exposure regatta because of it. >> i happened to be chief of staff for the then mayor when the dnc came to town and that is a role you do not want to be in. the most powerful thing that came out it was, we changed our own minds about what was possible.

we as a region and a community started to see ourselves being able to achieve things we never thought we could have achieved before. that might be the more powerful transformation that occurred from that experience. we now believe there is no limit in what we are capable of doing. >> another question from the audience, a question about quality of life issues and how much it matters to boosting growth in the city. chris, your company made a decision about where to locate. obviously you had a lot of options. talk a little bit about what quality of life things mattered as you guys went to make that decision, and greg, obviously you find something about the quality of life here, but you

obviously need to recruit people to come and work there. what is it about pittsburg that you can sell? >> in denver, the quality of life is an easy thing to talk about. we are lucky to be in a part of the country with a wonderful climate, access to wonderful recreation, and lots of folks move there from other places who like to engage with each other. on a high level, that then things are, for their recreation opportunities? the deeper than that, how can our teammates engage in the community, and what are they going to find when they engage? will they find a welcoming committee in a deep way or a shallow way? will they fine grade schools and great infrastructure? can they ride their bicycles around the city of denver comfortably from one end to the other?

there are dozens of factors in quality of life. the easy ones are obvious. that is why a lot of folks move to colorado. there is a lot of inbound migration that helps us as an employer looking for great talent. we have a community that allows us to engage in a powerful way. that raises the quality of life for all our teammates in denver today. >> what would you like to see improved when it comes to quality of life? >> i wish the weather would get better. if the mayor could stop the fires in northern colorado, we would be really happy. is getting smoky in denver. the greatest thing about our decision here is the collaborative nature of how the city government, state government, local business leaders are coming together.

to mayor hancock i would say just to continue to invest. there is a huge commitment to collaborating in the business community, not just because of jobs, but because we want the right people to come and be part of our community. our company has done that over the last few years. thousands and thousands of hours of volunteer time. we do it because we know we are part of the city that has partnered with us. i could not tell him to do anything other than continue to do that. we are doing a great job and there are lots of examples we can share. >> first and foremost, we have the steelers. [laughter] i guess you have to be from pittsburg to appreciate that. i will not repeat some of the things i said earlier in terms of access to universities and employers.

that is very important. whether you are at a site in the city for five years or 50 years, as chris knows, you are always assessing whether you are at the right place. it is an ongoing process, very important part of the fiduciary responsibility that we have as business heads. we have made that decision many times in pittsburg. i think for us, not just universities access for our employees but also for their children is a critical issue. the quality of education in the primary and secondary schools and at the university level is a great selling point for pittsburg. it is certainly a strength. another issue that is important for us is the cost of living. we do an assessment of all our sites and we have more than 50 across the country.

we probably have a half-dozen that i would consider to be major sites in northern new jersey and in raleigh and pittsburg and berkeley and houston, kansas city. when we benchmark those sites and those major areas every year, pittsburg is the lowest cost that we have across the country. when you make a combination of very low cost, low cost of living, which means a lower cost of operation for us, combined with an outstanding education system and a great supply of trained scientists, which we higher more than those, but that is really our lifebloo that is a great combo. i would be remiss if i did not mention pittsburg is a great place to live and to raise a family. that is important to all our employees. for those reasons we have stayed for 50 years. every couple of years we make

that assessment again, but i think pittsburg continues year after year to be our choice for those reasons. >> i saw joel nodding vigorously. we have time for maybe two more questions. rich, i'll ask this of you and may be mayor hancock. how do you measure success? one of the things -- we can talk about all the things we would like to do but it does not mean that much unless we can say we started here and we ended up here and that is how we know we are succeeding. what specifically are you looking at changing and how do you know when you are being successful? >> success in all the things we do in government goes to a commonality of creating and providing jobs and opportunities. one of the things about pittsburg is people love it. even many who have had to leave

for 25 or 30 years -- you may have to leave pittsburg, but pittsburg never leave you. it is just a great place. i view it as trying to provide opportunities for young people when they get out of school. if they don't have to move away. for 25 years we were losing population and that has now changed. the young people are moving in, coming to us. i would say making it an attractive place to move, and the one thing about quality of life is, we have a major presence with google in our community. google is always trying to attract people. they say once we get them here, once we get them through the tunnel, they stay. but we have to get in there. that is how i would judge that.

>> we were just sitting here conferring. success comes a lot of different packages. it is judged are measured by the landing of a nonstop flight from denver to tokyo, which will bring $130 million per year in economic impact. it is judged by the decision by a company like the solar to move their mobile headquarters to denver. those are extremely important. i understand the importance and how serious those decisions are to relocate your employees. it is a company that says we want to stay and grow bigger. pro logis built additional towers and it grew employees.

everything begins to jive and is focused for the future and helping to build for the next generation. it is not about the next election, it is about the next generation. when those things are at jiving in moving your state forward, then you are beginning to reach optimal success. it is all relative and depends on what you are working on. >> we have time for one more question for kelly and dennis. i want to bring it back to the fact that we had a state panel with governors drive before this one. obviously pittsburg in denver are two of the major engines in their state, and philadelphia to some extent, too. you are situated in a state. are there ever times that you are saying that things would be

so much better if it were not for the knuckleheads in the state house? our cities able to do some things on their own, or are you bound by what is going on when it comes to taxes and regulatory environment? how can other city leaders -- are they dealing with the states are working around them in ways that are not conducive to growth? >> we never refer to anyone as a knucklehead in colorado. there is no question, yes, we are working with our state. almost every single policy issue that we impact as a chamber is a statewide policy issue for us. that is where we spend most of our time, making sure we are creating a statewide environment that really supports business and allows us to achieve success. what is key in terms of making headway in that effort, because i cannot imagine any major city is different in terms of its needs, is that you form those

relationships where there is an understanding of what you are trying to accomplish, focus on the goal you are going for and remove the distractions which can be party or platforms or other things, and really try to get everyone to look at the goal you are trying to achieve, and finally i would recommend all -- you can actually text your ideas very quickly and see if you can try to influence policy that way. >> reiterating part of that, there is no substitute with working our state government officials. there is so much they do that affects the environment of developing an economy that you have to work with them. pittsburg is also doing something that is important. we are within 30 minutes of three other states, ohio, west virginia, and the panhandle of maryland.

a lot of the issues we deal with, transportation issues, economic development clusters, work force, do not stop with those artificial boundaries. we have begun to cross state lines. we have an energy initiative with west virginia. we have a federal research initiative with cleveland. we even have a broader regional initiative with all the power of 32, which is 32 counties in four states all working together on a series of things that brings all that together. that is something we can do at a regional level that is harder to do at a state level. >> we are running out of time. i just want to encourage you all to pick up the study that was put out by our friends. tom started to talk earlier about pointing out that despite all the partisan rancor going on in washington, there is a lot to be really optimistic about in the country. if you listen to what is going on in denver and pittsburgh,, is absolutely right. please join me in thanking our

panelists for a great panel. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2012] >> on "washington journal" william bennett discusses the issues in the 2012 campaign. the president of the american federation of teachers talks about the role of unions following the recall of scott walker. a look at the impact of watergate with the author of "the strongman." "washington journal" live at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. next >> become jamie dimon testifies before the house