Historic numbers of American voters for off-year elections stepped up demanding change in their communities last week. Across the U.S. underdog candidates and ballots swept the results, shifting the political terrain and bringing new voices to political tables.
The people are tired of their needs not being met, including prices being too high for everything from housing to food to electricity and beyond. Many are also concerned about their homes floating down a river or their livelihoods disappearing due to the increasingly ferocious and frequent extreme weather events accelerating due to climate change.
This weekend thousands of leaders begin to gather in Belém, Brazil for the huge United Nations Conference of the Parties, COP30 to address climate change and what countries can and should do.
Over half the global population lives in cities – So, what do they want and need?
Since over half the population, 4 billion people, lives in urban areas, according to The World Bank, cities are key to a range of solutions. By 2050, that number is expected to double to about 7 billion people. So, what are cities doing to address city-dwellers’ concerns?
Last week I got some answers at the huge gathering of nearly 30,000 people at the Smart City Expo World Congress 2025 in Barcelona, Spain. I saw remarkable innovations and spoke with hundreds of talented people across sectors, cities and borders who are developing innovative strategies, policies, technologies and solutions to various urban challenges. These are the leaders closest to the people, the ones who have to care about local infrastructure – water, roads, housing, electricity, transportation and the cost of living, as well as keeping their communities safe from the ravages of climate events.
I had the privilege of moderating a session with three women leaders from three different countries who are wrestling very different but related issues. The panelists were: Asuka Ito, who is an international advisor to the Government of Japan’s Cabinet Office on the Cross-ministerial Strategic Innovation Promotion Program (SIP). She links policy, public-private partnerships and real-world pilots, some of which she helps scale; Nidya Pesántez, who currently serves as the UN Women Resident Representative in Bolivia. Her work includes coordinating the Environmental Strategy for a Just Transition in Latin America and the Caribbean, which benefits from her 35+ years in sustainable development, human rights and women’s rights; and Sofía María Galnares, who is the youngest elected provincial deputy in Santa Fe province, Argentina, and President of the Commission on Environment and Natural Resources in the Legislature.
Here are key insights from groundbreaking work in their communities I gleaned from our discussion and the projects they talked about:
Fortunately Pesántez served as a translator for Galnares as needed. Here are
- Tap women leaders: Women leaders in communities are dialed into their communities’ needs and cultures, and can mobilize people. The recycling project that gave women paid work that Pesántez described during the panel was a telling example of how these projects can be a win-win-win. They help the community by addressing a top challenge (waste, in this case), they help the planet by keeping garbage out of landfills, and they help the women by giving them paid work and a leadership role that taps their talents, and by keeping them safer from violent attacks.
- Identify and scale local initiatives: These local projects serve specific community needs and engage the local residents, as well as demonstrate tangible results. Once there are tangible results to talk about, the projects are easier to get support to scale.
- Leverage public-private-community partnerships: A pervasive theme across all the projects the panelists described was the concept of public-private-community partnerships. Ito talked about a SIP project that had 30% of its funding from public sources and 70% of it from private sources, for example. Some projects even secured funding from other countries. The community’s buy-in is crucial too. Pesántez also pointed out that they were able to secure empty buildings to house the recycling once it was picked up for no cost, by tapping their partnerships.
- Communicate clearly, often and in all ways about the project’s benefits, including in person and through the media: Focus those benefits on addressing the community’s key priorities too. This keeps them engaged. Ito said they even issued open applications for the public to get directly involved and started their communications early. “They started with a strategic plan, a participatory strategic plan,” she explained, “So everybody to participate and give her their ideas. And meanwhile they are looking for a budget to start with the infrastructure. All the time they were working with the population showing the relevance of the project, showing what good will be and taking their ideas.”
- Be clear on your success criteria and metrics: For Galnares, who talked about converting a lagoon to a beautiful park, the increasing number of visitors to the park was one of the key metrics. For Pesántez’s recycling project, it was the amount of recycling picked up and improving women’s plights, and how they changed policies. “Now we have 11 private institution and industry industries that approved a specific institutional policies to separate the waste, helping them, helping women to do in a better way their jobs and also improving the economic situation for women.”
- Mindset matters: Pesántez talked about the challenge of having to change people’s perceptions of picking up recycling and of women working. They had to make sure people understood it was a paying job, how the women would be safe both from violence and illness (from handling the recycling), and the public and private support behind them.
These leaders talked about how women leaders particularly created the relationships and community support – and found a way – for these innovative climate-related initiatives. Each one had a positive impact on their respective community.
Breaking new ground requires bold ideas and buy-in across sectors – and women leaders – to help our cities thrive, not just survive.