Cities lead as crisis intensifies

As the Covid-19 crisis unfolds and builds across the country, Americans are increasingly turning to city leaders to make sense of this new reality. And whether it’s by providing guidance on masks, rethinking the priorities of metropolitan transportation systems, or offering consistent messaging in what has become a patchwork of stay-at-home orders, city leaders are delivering. Catch up with all of our coverage below, and sign up for our new email newsletter, the City Hall Coronavirus Daily Update.

• Mayors mask up to show what the new normal looks like
• 5 actions cities can take to maximize federal aid
• Dr. Josh Sharfstein says testing is just the start
• COVIDActNow: Free modeling tool for cities
• 5 things cities can do keep transit systems going
• Mayors push consistency in stay-at-home orders
• 5 ways cities are supporting their homeless

MEET TINA WALHA

Title: Director, Innovation & Performance
City: Seattle

Seattle is earning praise for its nimble response to Covid-19, and Tina Walha sits right in the middle of the action. She believes that getting things done quickly in a crisis like this one demands not only a just-do-it attitude but also an instinct to collaborate with partners outside City Hall. For example, to solicit donations of respirators, gowns, and other personal protective equipment, Walha’s innovation team built a simple online survey and circulated it with dentists’ offices, private labs, and others. They then partnered with Goodwill Industries to serve as drop-off points and another organization for warehouse storage. The donations are now transitioning to state control so that equipment can be distributed where the greatest needs are. “Innovation requires identifying unlikely allies that can help you accelerate impact,” Walha said. “We worked in a really agile way to get the logistics figured out.” Walha is applying the same collaborate-quickly mindset to other problems, working with Microsoft to develop a data tool to monitor hospital capacity, as well as state government to iron out kinks in getting unemployment insurance checks out to residents quickly. At a moment when local government has a million hairy problems to solve, Walha finds that one of the most valuable innovation tools is problem definition—working carefully up front to determine exactly which parts of different problems staff have the bandwidth to solve. “What’s helping to accelerate problem solving in this critical time,” she said, “is getting clear on problem definition, working in a really agile way, and then getting the hell out of the way.”

Pro tip: “Stay humble, hustle hard.”

WHAT WE’RE READING

NETWORK NEWS

DATABASE: Bloomberg Philanthropies has partnered with the National League of Cities to launch the Covid-19: Local Action Tracker to identify and catalogue actions taken by U.S. mayors and city governments in real time. Make sure your city’s efforts are counted by submitting it to the tracker.  

DATABASE: Bloomberg Philanthropies and the National Association of City Transportation Officials have put together the Covid-19: Transportation Response Center to provide cities with rapid response tools and city transportation action updates.
 
DATABASE: What Works City has put together a Covid-19: Local Government Response and Resource Bank for local government leaders. 
 
DATABASE: John Hopkins University is providing up-to-date case counts and other critical information through their situation report and interactive map. 

LEARNING OPPORTUNITY: What Works Cities and U.S. Digital Response are hosting a webinar this Friday, April 10, at 3 p.m. ET for cities to learn about data and technology projects that can help with Covid-19 response. Register here.
 
Contact us to share events and job postings with the Bloomberg Cities network.