We had a branding problem. We have allowed ourselves to be branded by our tragedies. If you said 'Oklahoma City,' chances are the next word out of your mouth was 'bombing.'
When you have a lot of construction going on, it sends a message of vitality that builds up consumer confidence. It gets people to spend money when they see that energy, that things are happening.
We did such a great job of creating the interstate highway system in Oklahoma City that we don't have traffic congestion. You can actually get a speeding ticket during rush hour in the city. That's how great our traffic flows.
Donald Trump is in a partisan election, so he views the role differently than Mitch Landrieu and I who are are trying to lead our cities in a bipartisan or nonpartisan manner.
I believe in infrastructure, I believe in investing in your hard assets. Where I think government starts to fail is when it starts getting itself weighed down with the social programs. And I think the American public just feels like a lot of that money is tossed aside and wasted.
The bottom line is that we have entered an age when local communities need to invest in themselves. Federal and state dollars are becoming more and more scarce for American cities. Political and civic leaders in local communities need to make a compelling case for this investment.
Jobs follow people. People don't follow jobs.
It`s nice to get president candidates` attention to infrastructure need which is really a ticking time bomb in America. But as important as the dollar amounts are, we need to know that this money is gonna go directly to cities. So we`re gonna be able to put it to use. In previous administrations and in previous efforts on infrastructure, the money has gone through states and it never seems to find its way to the nation`s cities.
The spoiled superstar brat wouldn't get far in Oklahoma City. We're very value-conscious. Our city was settled in a land run. Those 10,000 people were desperate for a better life.
If your city's being populated by highly educated twentysomething s with choices, you're probably going to succeed.
We need a better strategy for poor people...because what we're doing isn't working.
It is not OK for anyone to be obese. There needs to be a cultural shift.
I've never seen a tornado and I've lived in Oklahoma City basically my whole life. It's not like we're infested with them on a continual basis. But you learn to live with the warnings. And you learn what to do if one is coming your way. And then you cross your fingers and make the best judgments you can.
Cities have to realize that whatever the federal government is going to do, its not going to be enough. And cities that proactively take control of their own quality of life initiatives are going to be the cities that ultimately attract the highly talented young people and create the jobs.
People in Oklahoma don't wake up every morning wondering what the government is going to do for them.
People look for their leadership to lead.
I'd rather we were rebuilding Philadelphia, as opposed to Kabul...There are American cities with serious infrastructure problems and we're not addressing them.
