Mayors and City Teams Convene on New Approaches to Listening Better and Rebuilding Public Trust

How do cities make community engagement a durable process through the application of data and emerging technologies? How do residents feel seen and heard by their local government? These questions guided a two-part convening hosted by Data-Smart City Solutions, located at the Bloomberg Center for Cities at Harvard University, and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation at Harvard Kennedy School on September 28-30.

The convening brought together participants from the Responsive Cities Network, a three-year initiative led by Data-Smart City Solutions and supported by the Knight Foundation. The Network helps 10 cities use data and generative AI to better understand resident needs, improve public services, and strengthen trust in local government.

Mayors and senior city leaders first met for programming on how cities listen to residents, adapt to their needs, and communicate progress. Network city teams then spent two days working through civic AI use cases. Alongside new technology, participants discussed how to build shared understanding between residents and government; the problems residents see on their street often look different from the issues city staff capture, and those differences can keep experiences siloed. A new article from Data-Smart City Solutions explores how technology can make government more legible, but trust depends on residents and government building a shared understanding of problems and acting on it together.
 

Leading a Government Residents Can See and Trust: Part One

The mayors’ program opened with a dinner conversation on listening and communicating with new tools. Stephen Goldsmith, Derek Bok Professor of the Practice of Urban Policy at Harvard Kennedy School and director of Data-Smart City Solutions; Maribel Pérez Wadsworth, president and CEO of Knight Foundation; and Kaitlin Yarnall, chief storytelling officer at the National Geographic Society, discussed how leaders have more tools than ever to listen to residents, respond to their needs, and communicate progress, and how storytelling can help bring unheard perspectives into the public record.

The next morning, Kimberlyn Leary of Harvard Kennedy School led a session exploring how residents, city staff, and computer vision systems see different aspects of neighborhood conditions, and how those perspectives shape what government defines as important and actionable. Leaders discussed whose concerns reach a mayor’s desk: residents with the most access have traditionally been heard first, but platforms like social media now gives more people a way to raise issues publicly. Several described how their cities are using 311 as a source of insight, tracking how long requests take and how satisfied residents are with the outcome. Others raised the limits of a complaint itself: residents define problems differently, some neighborhoods report less than others, and responding only to the most frequent requests can pull resources from the greatest needs.

In a session on building capacity to act and adapt, Sari Ladin-Sienne, senior program director at Data-Smart City Solutions, and Shin-pei Tsay, chief information officer for the city of Boston, led an AI demonstration and an exercise on how mayors can lead upskilling, adopt a learning routine with staff, and build the guardrails needed to expand what works. Eric Gordon, director of the Center for Media Innovation & Social Impact at Boston University, led a discussion on how mayors can communicate constraints, tradeoffs, timelines, and progress through trusted local messengers. He argues that correcting misinformation directly rarely works, and that cities do better by listening first and shaping the story over time.

"Residents decide whether to trust their government based on what they can see. Mayors now have tools that let them hear from residents at a scale that wasn't possible a decade ago. The leaders in this room are using those responsiveness tools to find problems earlier, fix them faster, and show residents the results,” said Goldsmith.

That afternoon, Mayors Cherelle Parker of Philadelphia, Matt Mahan of San José, and Shammas Malik of Akron joined Goldsmith to speak with the Network teams about the operating practices, community-centered innovations, and responsible uses of AI and data that help cities deliver better services.

The Responsive Cities Network Sprint: Part Two

That afternoon, Mayors Cherelle Parker of Philadelphia, Matt Mahan of San José, and Shammas Malik of Akron joined Goldsmith to speak with the Network teams about the operating practices, community-centered innovations, and responsible uses of AI and data that help cities deliver better services.

About 40 people from the Network teams spent the next two days testing their civic AI use cases against real resident needs. Ladin-Sienne and Lilly Weinberg, senior director of community impact at Knight Foundation, kicked off a sprint with the cities.

Two Harvard case studies helped teams identify the elements needed to build civic infrastructure for meaningful participation and long-term collaboration. Alex Pascal, executive director of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, led a discussion of how a city moved from a system of neighborhood councils and small grants to a proactive approach that engaged residents. And Maurice Cox of the Harvard Graduate School of Design examined the coordination of revitalization strategies across silos, sectors, and levels of government, and reflected on the leadership, relationships, and capabilities needed for long-term inclusive growth. Teams compared their own barriers to collaboration, including department ownership and bringing staff along with a shared vision.

On the convening’s final day, teams applied those lessons to their own city’s use cases, identifying where community engagement can strengthen their work. Each team presented to peers and faculty, describing the problem, the people they intend to serve, and the outcomes they hope to reach.

Deborah Tien, co-founder of the Relational Tech Project, joined and drew on lessons from the vTaiwan movement to show how civic technology, public deliberation, facilitation, and government commitments can help cities listen earlier, identify areas of consensus, and respond transparently. She urged teams to plan for durability through relationships, budgets, and habits that remain after a project’s champion moves on. Over lunch, Amy Chen and Tal Roded presented Block Party, which turns complex community board records into searchable public knowledge in New York City.

In the afternoon buildathon, teams turned their use cases into early prototypes that help make the resident experience tangible. Judah Axelrod of the Urban Institute helped teams identify the evidence needed to assess whether their ideas are helping residents and strengthening government responsiveness, from setting baselines with current data to testing with small groups of residents before a full launch.

"These city teams arrived with ideas and left with prototypes they can test with residents. What makes this work last is the civic infrastructure around it: strong relationships between staff and residents, dedicated resources for engagement, and habits that keep communities involved in the entire process," said Ladin-Sienne.

Learn more about the Responsive Cities Network and its Service Innovation Fellows.