Day 2: 2023 AARP Livable Communities Economic Development Workshop

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT: Day 2 Welcome!

Mike Watson: Welcome and thank you for joining us for Day 2 of the 2023 AARP Livable Communities Workshop: Economic Development, Connecting to Opportunity. For those of you who weren't with us yesterday, I'm Mike Watson, Director of Livable Communities and Enterprise Lead for Livable Communities at AARP. And today, I'm here with my colleague, Carly Roszkowski, Vice President of Financial Resilience at AARP.

Carly Roszkowski: Thanks, Mike. It's fantastic to be here for another day of engaging discussions, presentations, and more. Similarly to Day 1, you'll see us both periodically throughout the program to help facilitate our conversations and your engagement with our speakers.

Yesterday, we focused on the place-based elements of economic development. We had some deep dive discussions with expert panelists addressing how the built environment and digital connections positively impact both local economies and promote upward mobility and independence. We had the great pleasure of hearing from Deb Socia, President and CEO of the Enterprise Center, who is connecting people to resources all over Chattanooga, Tennessee.

We had a great conversation about how livability features, such as multimodal transportation, housing diversity and vibrant downtowns positively impact local economies with Marcus King and Toccarra Nicole Thomas. We heard from Mignon Clyburn, former commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission, who has worked across her entire career to enable entrepreneurship and innovation in diverse communities.

And finally, we heard from two local leaders who are taking action, Knoxville, Tennessee, Mayor Indya Kincannon and Rochester Hills, Michigan, Mayor Bryan Barnett. It was an inspiring day and we're so excited to hear from more great folks in today's program. So Mike, what should our viewers know to get started?

Mike Watson: Thanks Carly. Yeah, there's going to be some important things we want to underscore before we get started. And if you participated yesterday, you're familiar with the various platforms that we're using, so this will be a bit of a refresher. But if today is your first time watching, I want to go over a few critical pieces of the platforms that will ensure you have a great experience today.

So first, on the screen, you should see the instructions for engaging in Zoom chat, which allows you to send a message to everyone or just to specific attendees. And just like yesterday, we're going to get the conversation going there again. So yesterday, we asked you to share your biggest challenge your community is facing on economic development.

Now today, can you drop in the most promising or innovative thing your community has done to improve economic development where you live? I'm really looking forward to reading through these later, and I know folks on our team are already digging in. Again, we invite you to begin now by sharing the most promising and innovative thing your community has done to improve economic development where you live.

And of course, you can use chat for conversation throughout the workshop. And if you have questions about the Zoom platform, you can enter those in the chat and a Zoom expert will help you. Now, I also want to familiarize you with some of the accessibility features today. And just like yesterday, if you'd like to turn on closed captioning, please click on the CC button to turn on those captions.

And you should also see a speaker box on your screen with our American Sign Language interpreters, Shamika and Amanda. And of course, please join the other participants by engaging with us on social media platforms like Facebook and X, using the #AARPLivable, all one word. And following along on our handle @AARPLivable.

And again, just like yesterday, we'll be using the platform Slido for polling and to facilitate your questions of our speakers. Now on your screen, you should see the instructions for joining Slido. You'll either be able to log into your browser and type in Slido and enter the event code Livable2023. That's all one word. Or you can pull out your phone and scan the QR code on the screen. We're going to test this out in a second, but before we do, we know that sometimes you'll have to miss portions of the event, but never fear. This entire program is being recorded and it will be posted and shared on AARP.org/Livable2023 in the coming weeks. So now that we've covered all that, Carly, are we ready to test out a poll?

Carly Roszkowski: Yes. Thanks, Mike. I think we are ready to go. Let's test this out now with our first poll question. So follow those instructions and make sure you're on the Polls tab.

Here is our warm-up question: "What state or country are you joining us from?"

If you're not there yet, join us in Slido and tell us what state or country you're joining from today. Mike, what are we seeing?

Mike Watson: Well first of all, I think we're seeing a very consistent and similar trend to yesterday. Minnesota, Wisconsin were pretty high up on the list, pretty big and bold yesterday. And there we go again, Minnesota is right in the center of that, um, shining bright. So, uh, shout out to AARP Minnesota. And all of your partners and colleagues for joining in today. But we also see folks from Florida, my home state of North Carolina, and other places joining as well. California, Pennsylvania. So, lots of representation from across the country here today. But again, a big prominent presence from Minnesota.

Carly Roszkowski: Excellent. Excellent to see so many people tuning in. Thank you. So that gives you a sense of where we're all tuning in from and how to use the tool. So today we're also going to be using this app with some quiz questions throughout the event. So let's go to our first one.

Livable communities features are good for people, but they're also good for business, leading to higher property values and increased economic activity and savings. The question is, "Which of the following is not associated with higher property values?" Is it a. walkability, b. availability of off-street parking, c. nearby parks, d. compact development patterns, e. accessory dwelling unit permitting, or f. complete streets policies?

Go ahead and make your choice. Mike, what are we seeing from the early polls?

Mike Watson: So Carly, I think we're getting a really strong response on the availability of off-street parking. So a lot of folks, around half of the people who are responding, are saying that the availability of off-street parking is not associated with higher property values. Roughly 16 or 15 folks are saying complete streets policy and compact development patterns. But again, a pretty strong response, underscoring that the availability of off-street parking is not associated with higher property values.

Carly Roszkowski: We have a lot of correct people in the room. The correct answer is B, availability of off-street parking is not associated with higher property values.

So homes closer to parks and open spaces have higher property values than those further away. And demand for compact communities consistently increases property values by more than 15 percent for office, residential, and retail use.

Alright, let's try one more: "To what extent does a one-point increase in a neighborhood score on WalkScore.com affect the area home values?" Is it:

• A. an increase of as much as $500
• B. an increase of as much as $3,000
• C. a slight decrease, or
• D. the walk score doesn't have any effect on home values but does increase rents

So go ahead and make your choice. Mike, what are we seeing now?

Mike Watson: So Carly, again, we got a pretty strong response here. About 70 percent of people are saying that it affects property values by an increase of as much as $3,000. And another 22 percent are saying that it increases properties by about $500. Now we were kind of batting a thousand leading into this question, got the first one right. I know the answer to this, and I think we're going to continue that trend. Carly, do you want to tell us what the answer is?

Carly Roszkowski: Yes, the correct answer is B. CEOs for Cities found that a one-point increase on your score on WalkScore.com does increase the value of homes by as much as $3,000. So small improvements can make huge impacts in communities.