ULI Announces Moderators, Panelists For Upcoming Symposium

Press release from The Cleveland District Council of the Urban Land Institute:

Feb. 2, 2021

The Cleveland District Council of the Urban Land Institute and the City of Cleveland, with support from the Cleveland Foundation, are excited to announce the names of the featured panelists and moderators for Building the 21st Century City: The Future Is Now!, a virtual symposium to be held from March 2-3, 2021.

The two-day symposium will discuss themes that will allow the city to maximize its future prosperity with an emphasis on inclusivity. Three tracks will be utilized: technology, mobility and inclusive economic development. These three key topics will be discussed to help facilitate development of realistic programs and policies by the City of Cleveland.

The first day of the forum (March 2) ideastream’s Rick Jackson will kick off the discussion as the opening master of ceremonies. Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson, ULI Cleveland District Council Chair Steve Ross, and Cleveland City Planning Director Freddy Collier Jr. will follow with opening remarks. The symposium’s first day will close with keynote speaker, Ben Hammersley, who is a world-renowned futurist and strategic forecaster.

The second day of the symposium will feature other keynote speakers including technology track speaker Debra Lam, mobility track speaker Gabe Klein, and inclusive economic development track speaker Tawanna A. Black.

Lam will moderate the morning technology panel, Broadband Access - Methods, Financing and Equity. The panelists for this session include:

• Mark Patton, Vice President, Smart Cities at the Columbus Partnership
• Leon Wilson, Chief of Digital Innovation and Chief Information Officer at The Cleveland Foundation
• Lev Gonick, Chief Information Officer of Arizona State University

Adie Tomer, Metropolitan Infrastructure Initiative Lead Fellow for the Metropolitan Policy Program at The Brookings Institution, will moderate the afternoon technology panel, Preparing for New Technologies - Electric and Autonomous Vehicles, Digital Signage and Media - Methods, Financing and Infrastructure. The panelists for the afternoon technology session include:

• Lauren Isaac, Director of Business Incentives for EasyMile
• Mark Zannoni, Transportation and Smart Cities Consultant and Principal, Zannoni & Co., Ltd.
• Jordan Davis, Director of Smart Columbus at Columbus Partnership
• Dr. Nigamanth Sridhar, Program Director, National Science Foundation and Professor of Computer Science at Cleveland State University

News Channel 5 reporter Homa Bash will moderate the morning mobility panel, Improving Transit for All Modes and Developing the 21st Century Right of Way. The panelists for this session will include:

• Jerome Horne, Experience Specialist at IndyGo Ridership
• William Burns, Head of Government Partnerships US East at SPIN
• India Birdsong, General Manager and Chief Executive Officer of Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority

ideastream Executive Editor Mike McIntyre will moderate the afternoon mobility panel, Logistics and Distribution and Funding Alternatives for the 21st Century. The panelists for this session will include:

• Michael Peters, Chief Executive Officer and Founder of Sway Mobility Inc.
• Grace Gallucci, Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of Northern Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency (NOACA)
• Howard Wood, Executive Director of DriveOhio

Michelle Jarboe, enterprise reporter at Crain’s Cleveland Business, will moderate the morning inclusive economic development panel, Business Location Decisions, including Workforce Recruiting and Development. This session will feature several panelists including:

• Christine Nelson, Vice President of Project Management, Site Strategies and Talent at Team NEO
• Didi Caldwell, President and Founding Principal of Global Location Strategies
• Anthony Antonelli, Vice President of Finance, Tiger Pistol
• Autumn Russell, Vice President of Diversity and Inclusion, Early College Early Career at MAGNET

Baiju Shah, Senior Fellow for Innovation at the Cleveland Innovation Project, will moderate the afternoon economic development panel, Growing Sectors of the Economy. This session will feature several panelists including:

• Gloria Ware, Director of the KeyBank Center for Technology Innovation and Inclusive Growth at Jumpstart
• Lance Hill, Chief Executive Officer of Within3
• Phyllis Ellison, Director of Entrepreneur Services & Institutional/Corporate Partnerships at CoreTex Innovation Community
• Travis Sheridan, Chief Community Officer and Senior Vice President at Wexford Science + Technology

Ticket pricing includes admission to programming on March 2-3, recordings of the symposium following the event dates, and admission to a virtual networking reception with program attendees. For group rates, please email cleveland@uli.org. For more information and to sign up for the ULI Cleveland mailing list, visit cleveland.uli.org.

Early registration tickets end Friday, February 19. Early registration prices are Private (member) $80 / (non-member) $115; Public/Non-profit/Academic (member) $60 / (non-member) $90; Student (member) $30 / (non-member) $50. (Private pricing applies to those who work for a private company.) Groups of 10 or more people from one organization will receive $10 off registration prices. AIA HAS/APA and Real Estate continuing education credits for participants are pending. For more information about the symposium schedule, speakers, and sponsorship opportunities, visit https://cleveland.uli.org/events/building-the-21st-century-city-the-future-is-now/.

This press release was produced by The Cleveland District Council of the Urban Land Institute. The views expressed here are the author's own.