The semiarid cities of Nogales, Arizona, and Nogales, Sonora, technically stand on separate sides of the US–Mexico border. But together, they form a transborder metropolis known as Ambos Nogales (Both Nogales). These sister cities share a binational economy and culture, and they also share the same watershed—one where summer monsoons bring half a year’s worth of rain in two months.

On the steep, hilly, and more populous Mexican side, that deluge often turns deadly. In August 2022, three people in Nogales, Sonora, including two young children, were killed as heavy monsoon rains flooded the streets and trapped them inside vehicles. The summer before, flash flooding there claimed the life of a 24-year-old woman who had recently earned her civil engineering degree.

“Stormwater management is one of the major issues for the Ambos Nogales area,” says Joaquin Marruffo, border programs manager at the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality. “Almost every monsoon season, at least one person dies on the Mexican side of the border [due to stormwater flooding], so that should be priority number one for local governments and for us as public officials.”

Like other border towns in Mexico, Nogales has grown rapidly in the last two decades; the population increased 20 percent between 2010 and 2020, as people from other areas moved there seeking work or hoping to enter the US. This growth has largely been unplanned, resulting in settlements springing up “in places that shouldn’t be established,” Marruffo says, “such as the top of the hills or where there is a floodplain.”

The heavy rains also wreak havoc on property and infrastructure, and pollute local waterways on both sides of the border with industrial contaminants, sediment, and sewage overflow. “The highest point of the watershed is Nogales, Sonora, and the lowest is Nogales, Arizona,” Marruffo explains. “So everything, by gravity, flows from south to north. Everything that starts on the top of the watershed is going to drain down to the US side.”

Seeking to build upon decades of cross-border cooperation on stormwater management and water quality issues, officials and representatives from both sides of the border last year participated in a two-day Growing Water Smart workshop organized by the Sonoran Institute and the Lincoln Institute’s Babbitt Center for Land and Water Policy.

Growing Water Smart is a training and assistance program for local leaders that focuses on water and land use integration. The goal is to help officials identify and implement near-term plans, policies, and programs to achieve more resilient communities.

A major piece of the program is a multiday in-person workshop that brings together local and regional elected officials, water resource managers, economic development staff, sustainability officers, and planning commissioners, among others, who don’t always get to coordinate their efforts or pool their knowledge despite their shared goals. “It’s really about allowing them to discuss the issues and opportunities that are unique to them and to their context, and then supporting them with tools and facilitating good guidance,” says Noah Kaiser, Growing Water Smart program manager at the Sonoran Institute.

But the program is more than just a one-off workshop: The Sonoran Institute provides follow-up assistance to help communities secure funding and support project development.

Marruffo, who attended the Ambos Nogales workshop in June 2024, says the strong regional reputation of the Sonoran Institute brought credibility to the discussions, and that the ongoing support will help ensure that momentum doesn’t wane. “They’re probably one of the strongest collaborators that we have to address water issues, especially for the Santa Cruz River,” he says, which flows from Arizona into Mexico and back again.

The workshop “was a great opportunity to have a mix of different sectors involved from both sides, which is not easy to accomplish, getting local governments to speak face-to-face on the same problems,” Marruffo says. He felt encouraged by a new willingness on both sides of the border to make investments in Sonora, in whose steep and hastily settled hillsides most of the area’s stormwater issues originate.

“Every major artery or road in the city of Nogales, Sonora, aligns perfectly with the washes [or stormwater channels],” Marruffo says. “So in storm events, the roads become rivers or streams.” Many roads are unpaved, so fast-flowing stormwater gathers sediment that scours away aging concrete infrastructure and clogs sewers, sending raw sewage into the waterways.

“If you want to mitigate the problem, there are many things that you can do. But to really solve the issue, you have to start by addressing the origin,” Marruffo says. “So the narrative started evolving: What type of investment do we need in Mexico? Which are the major infrastructure projects? Where should we locate these projects?”

Working with a comprehensive green infrastructure plan for the Ambos Nogales watershed developed by Arizona State University Professor Francisco Lara-Valencia, the group discussed the kinds of interventions needed to further mitigate stormwater impacts, Marruffo says, such as building retention and detention basins in the upper watershed to reduce the energy of flowing runoff and help with infiltration.

These aren’t new ideas for the region; local, state, and federal agencies have been working on these very issues for years. Indeed, Marruffo says, “It’s part of our daily conversations.” But the efforts made on one side of the border often have little connection to those on the other side, and vice versa. “This is the first binational, holistic, comprehensive master plan that includes the whole watershed,” he says.

“There are a lot of people in the region working on this stuff,” Kaiser agrees. But getting them all rowing in the same direction can make their efforts that much more effective, he notes. Cross-border and interagency cooperation is crucial when it comes to practical matters, like installing green infrastructure such as rain gardens and retention walls to reduce the impacts of flooding. But it also lays a foundation for exploring what’s possible—like whether the two cities can see this challenge as an opportunity, perhaps capturing stormwater for reuse.

A few months after the Ambos Nogales workshop, the Sonoran Institute and Babbitt Center hosted a second, similar Growing Water Smart program in Mexicali-Calexico, where southeast California borders Baja California. “In the Mexicali-Calexico region, the New River, which flows from Mexicali northward into Calexico and into the United States, is an extremely polluted river,” Kaiser says. “So a lot of our conversations at the workshop in Mexicali revolved around, How do we manage this river on both sides of the border? How do we improve its water quality? How do we make it a valuable water resource for communities on both sides of the border?’”

These border community workshops marked a new international milestone for the Growing Water Smart program (and required a few adaptations, Kaiser says, such as bilingual facilitators and curriculum materials). The program began in Colorado in 2017, and later expanded to Arizona, Utah, and California.

While the program helps communities think about their long-term water resiliency, “it also helps them get momentum right away with some immediate actions,” says Kristen Keener Busby, associate director of program implementation at the Babbitt Center. In addition to guiding land use professionals and water managers through the carefully curated curriculum and facilitated dialogue, she notes, “it sets them up with some strategic planning they can implement right away.”

All Growing Water Smart workshops focus on creating a near-term 12- to 18-month action plan that aligns with a community’s realistic capacity; this is a physical document that community leaders can take with them, Kaiser explains. “We don’t want the workshop to be just another conference that they’re attending where they hear some panel information, and they have some conversations, and then they go back to work and nothing changes,” he says. “We want them to develop a tool that they can move forward with.”

One of the final working sessions is dedicated to action planning, with an in-depth exploration of funding sources, in-kind opportunities, and grants that teams can apply to. The aim is to help teams decide what they’re going to do, how they’re going to fund it, and other practical logistics. “What resources do we need? Which agencies are going to lead, which are going to support? Which other agencies do we need to keep apprised of what we’re doing? Who do we need to collaborate with? All those details go into the action plan,” Kaiser says.

“And we as facilitators from Sonoran Institute, Babbitt Center, and other partner agencies, we’re not deciding what that looks like,” Kaiser adds. “The point of the action plan is really for them to be able to take charge of it, and not to be assigned work to do, but to make their own decisions about what do we have capacity for? What is meaningful and makes the most sense to us, and how can we push that forward?”

The next US–MX Border Growing Water Smart event is a one-day convening in June, focusing on the cross-border sister cities of Douglas, Arizona, and Agua Prieta, Sonora.

After all, stormwater and contaminants don’t care about national boundaries, and need no visa to enter the US, Marruffa says. “So it’s fundamental to continue engaging between both countries. I think it’s important that we have these types of conversations and dialogue, because that’s the only way we can strategize and make better use of our resources, on both sides,” he says.

“There are asymmetries and disparities in many ways, socioeconomic and political. But I think these types of opportunities to talk face-to-face with partners, from both sides, always have positive results. Always, something happens that is one step forward.”

Jon Gorey is a staff writer at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.

Lead image: The cities of Nogales, Sonora, and Nogales, Arizona, form the metro area known as Ambos Nogales. Credit: USGS.

In another edition of a mayors panel at the American Planning Association’s National Planning Conference, three Colorado mayors weighed in on the trials and tribulations of local leadership at a time of retrenchment at the federal level.

“If we’re going to get it done, it has to be done at the local level or the state level,” said Fort Collins Mayor Jeni Arndt, responding to a question about climate action. “In addition to reducing our carbon footprint, which has been a focus for a long time, something that we’re increasingly focused on is how to be resilient in the face of the climate change that is already happening and that we know is only going to get worse in the future. . . . We’re not going to stop.”

Arndt was joined by Boulder Mayor Aaron Brockett and Denver Mayor Mike Johnston, who appeared by prerecorded video, in a special session at the Colorado Convention Center co-moderated by Anthony Flint, author of Mayor’s Desk: 20 Conversations with Local Leaders Solving Global Problems, and Rob Walker,  author of City Tech: 20 Apps, Ideas, and Innovators Changing the Urban Landscape.

The mayors panel, a reprise of a similar Q&A with the mayors of Minneapolis, Cincinnati, and Scranton, Pennsylvania, at the 2024 National Planning Conference, was oriented around the use of technology in cities, from apps designed to facilitate civic engagement to geospatial mapping that can help identify buildable land for new housing.

“The data that we have available … is incredibly important when you’re evaluating what are the next opportunities,” said Brockett, noting efforts in Boulder to encourage infill redevelopment, which would add housing supply in a city well known for a lack of affordability.

Other highlights from the National Planning Conference 2025 included:

• The 2025 Trend Report: Emerging Trends and Signals.  This annual report, a partnership between APA and the Lincoln Institute, highlights trends for planners tasked with helping their communities navigate change and uncertainty. While conventional planning practices often reflect past data and current assumptions, the Trend Report is an account for emerging trends on the horizon. The presentation, with Petra Hurtado, Ievgeniia Dulko, Senna Catenacci, and Joseph DeAngelis from APA, outlined emerging trends and introduced strategies for making sense of the future. The speakers emphasized that by embracing foresight—understanding potential future trends and knowing how to prepare for them—planners can effectively guide change, foster more sustainable and equitable outcomes, and position themselves as critical contributors to thriving communities.
• Innovative Governance: Scenario Planning for Strategic Coordination. The Lincoln Institute’s Heather Sauceda Hannon, AICP, shared a case study of a one-day scenario planning workshop that brought together a range of government stakeholders to better prepare for future wildfires in Chile. Hannon detailed how the group applied the process of scenario planning—which is transferable to different types of issues—to identify uncertainties in the region, develop four possible futures, and agree on prioritized strategic actions. Because the group was tackling the problem from different perspectives, bringing them together fostered cohesion, an alignment of values, and a clearer path forward.
• Planning With Strategic Foresight. Heather Hannon also participated in a session that explored the practice of “futures literacy,” defined as the skills that facilitate better understanding of the role the future plays in a fast-changing world. She and Petra Hurtado, Ievgeniia Dulko, and Senna Catenacci from APA recognized that tech innovations, societal and political shifts, climate change, economic restructuring, and unknown ramifications from COVID-19 make it difficult to plan effectively, and suggested the path forward requires adjusting, adapting, and reinventing planning processes, tools, and skills. The approach entails the ability to imagine multiple plausible futures, and an understanding of how to prepare for future uncertainties, including the need to be nimble.
• APA Water and Planning Network Meeting. Led by Mary Ann Dickinson, policy director of Land and Water for the Lincoln Institute, this gathering drew land use planners and water systems planners who work toward better integration of water and land use planning. The activities of the APA’s 550-member Water and Planning Network, which include newsletters and webinars on relevant topics, were detailed for the year ahead.
• Housing Finance for Equitable Planning: Lessons from Cities. In this session in the virtual segment of the conference, Heather Hannon and Arica Young from the Lincoln Institute joined Samuel P. Leichtling from Milwaukee’s Department of City Development and Rico Quirindongo from Seattle’s Office of Planning and Community Development to help attendees better understand the residential housing market. Sharing trends and best practices from across the country, the presenters offered land use solutions and policies that balance the need for affordable housing while ensuring their cities are accessible to all.

Catherine Benedict is the digital communications manager at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.

Lead image: Downtown Boulder, Colorado, which is incorporating data analysis into its housing strategies. Credit: espiegle via Getty Images Plus.

As the 39th mayor of Providence, Rhode Island, Brett Smiley is addressing public safety, affordable housing, education, and climate resilience. Before being elected mayor in 2022, Smiley—who was born and raised in the Chicago area and moved to Rhode Island to work in politics in 2006—was head of the state Department of Administration, chief operating officer of Providence, and chief of staff for former Rhode Island Governor Gina Raimondo.

With a population of about 191,000, Providence is the third-largest city in New England after Boston and Worcester, Massachusetts. Once home to extensive manufacturing and mills, the city in recent years became known for embracing New Urbanism, historic preservation, and adaptive reuse, and for culinary, cultural, and arts innovations. The Congress for the New Urbanism is returning to Providence in the summer of 2025 for its annual summit.

Smiley sat for an interview with senior fellow Anthony Flint this spring at City Hall. Their conversation, which has been edited for length and clarity, is available as a Land Matters podcast.

Anthony Flint: The narrative arc of Providence over the last 30 years has been remarkable: a second city brought out of economic doldrums by dismantling highways and daylighting rivers and paying attention to urban design. Now there are concerns about affordability, beginning with housing. Where does the city go from here?

Brett Smiley: I appreciate you mentioning the remarkable progress that the city has made. We’ve come a long way, and while many postindustrial cities continue to struggle, Providence is on an entirely different trajectory. Through the pandemic, we had an influx of people wanting urban amenities, wanting arts and culture and diversity and walkability, but with a little bit less work than it is to live in Manhattan or Brooklyn, certainly less expensive than living in those places or in Boston.

One of our competitive points is that we were less expensive. But we’ve not kept pace with building, and as a result, housing prices are skyrocketing. We are on the top five list of net inflow migration, but 50 out of 50 for new housing starts. Our task is to make it easier to build more densely, and to do so in the context of the world in which we find ourselves, so that means incorporating green infrastructure, preparing for climate change, while also allowing for more growth.

We think we can actually lead the way in doing both. It’s an exciting time in the city. We don’t have a hard time selling Providence. What we have a hard time doing is making sure that there’s a home available for everyone who wants one.

AF: You’ve got different places where you can build infill, including surface parking lots. You’ve got some places that don’t require tearing anything down.

BS: We have plenty of places to build. One of our economic challenges has always been that we are in, from a cost perspective, the same economic market as Boston, and yet our rents or sales prices are significantly discounted to Boston. We’ve got a gap to fill there in terms of the price that the housing unit can command and the cost it takes to construct it, which is why we’re working so hard on allowances for things like bonuses for density and the relaxation of parking minimums, ways to try to allow developers to help projects become financially viable; while also looking at some more innovative solutions that cities around the countries are trying, such as changes to the fire code and other ways that actually will reduce the cost of construction by relaxing some of the regulatory requirements.

AF: Unlike the mayors of Boston or Paris, you’ve been a little less enthusiastic about the complete streets concept of pedestrian, bike, and bus lanes. How has your thinking evolved?

BS: I remain convinced that pedestrian safety is of critical importance. We know that one of the reasons that people like living in Providence and want to move to Providence is because of its walkability, and pedestrian safety is super important to me and to the city. We’ve also been working closely with the AARP. Pedestrian safety is really important to older residents. I’m convinced that Providence is a great city to retire to.

The dilemma that I see is that the discussion around bicycle lanes and those who commute by bicycle seems to consume a disproportionate share of the conversation. We know that only two to four percent of the population commutes by bike. We have aspirations of doubling or quadrupling that number. It’s still going to be less than 10 percent of people commuting by bike. We do want to see more people choosing that as an alternate means of transportation. When we’re talking about five percent of the commuting public, sometimes it feels like 75 percent of the conversation.

That’s the shift that I’ve been sensitive to, and I try to devote time and resources to the means and methods of transportation that most people actually use, which is not, in fact, biking. We’re in the Northeast. We have real winters. It’s a city of seven hills, famously in its history, and it doesn’t work for everyone to be able to commute by bike year-round. Most of those folks still have a car. I just try to be realistic about how much time and energy and resources we put into a slice of the commuting public that represents a relatively small minority.

AF: Can you reflect on the challenge of retaining major employers, like the toy manufacturer Hasbro, and the practice of offering things like tax breaks for economic development?

BS: The tactics for economic development have changed in my career in public service. At first, when I was working in government, people were trying to woo headquarters based upon incentives. Then corporate leaders were making decisions, and then the conversation shifted where it became all about talent. Headquarters were choosing where to go based upon where the talent was, maybe less so based upon the financial incentives. Then the pandemic changed it a third time, where with the increase of remote or hybrid work, people are starting to work anywhere and everywhere.

The really meaningful growth that we’ve seen over the last decade, and particularly since the pandemic, are people moving here with good jobs in hand that are located somewhere else or nowhere at all. They’re moving here with good jobs, and it doesn’t matter where their job is. The way in which we think about economic development has shifted. The way I think about economic development has shifted, which is one of the reasons that housing is so primary in my priorities because housing is, in fact, an economic development strategy.

When people can choose where they live and their job is not dependent on that location, you have to give them a high quality of life and an affordable home, and so that’s what we’re working on. Nevertheless, there is still a role for major site-based employers. In terms of municipalities’ reputation, companies that people know can be very important to your identity and to your city’s economic prospects and its brand, if you will, and Hasbro is one of those. It’s got a century-long history in Rhode Island. It’s currently headquartered in neighboring Pawtucket, Rhode Island.

The CEO there has said that that site is no longer working for them, and we found ourselves in a competition with Boston. To date, they’ve not made a decision, but we put forward a very compelling package and proposal, and I hope that they choose Providence. Part of our pitch, in addition to being competitive on an economic package, is again, back to this quality of life and livability. It’s really easy for me to convince the executive suite at Hasbro that mid-career professionals and young workers want to be here, that this is the kind of city that has a youthful vibrancy that other cities have, but it’s a place that they can actually afford to be.

We made a compelling economic package, and we would do that for other major employers as well to choose Providence. I will say, despite the comments about the importance of embracing the hybrid and remote workers, the other thing about having a corporate headquarters that really does matter is it impacts the investments that that company makes in the community, its philanthropy, and its volunteer time. Whereas hybrid or remote workers are often not doing the same level of investment in a community as a headquarters does.

There’s real value in making sure that there is a core corporate community that helps support and sustain our civic institutions, our artistic organizations, and other groups that rely on that corporate philanthropic support that seems to be most generous in the headquarters city as opposed to a regional office or a place in which they just happen to have hybrid or remote workers.

AF: A recent study found that Providence nightlife generates nearly a billion dollars a year in economic activity, but pointed out that many workers can’t catch a bus to go home after the bars and restaurants close. What can Providence, lacking a light rail or subway, do to improve transit?

BS: It’s important that we refer to it as life at night, because it’s not just nightlife. There are thousands of employees that work during what we refer to as “the other nine to five”: 9 p.m. to 5 a.m. That’s restaurants and hospitality and nightclubs, but also someone working the overnight shift at a hospital and other jobs like that.

We don’t have a subway or light rail system here in Providence or anywhere in Rhode Island. We have a bus system that works reasonably well during the day but is less frequent—and in the case of some lines, shuts down—late at night. The solutions are to look at other means of transportation like ridesharing and micromobility, and with our bus system, RIPTA, to provide better service to these major employment centers. We don’t need brand-new innovations. We just need to think about the delivery of services for this other period of time that often gets overlooked and forgotten.

I talk about arts and culture, but nightlife is a big part of it too. This is a fun city, and I think the most thriving nightlife in New England to be sure, with some pretty impressive statistics. On a per capita basis, Providence has more nightclubs than New York City. In terms of percentage of our population, we’re a more diverse city than Los Angeles. There’s something for everyone here and we know for a fact that people come down 95 to go out in Providence from the much bigger neighbor to our north, Boston.

Our reputation as a place of theater, live music, a growing comedy scene, a really vibrant Spanish language club scene, there is really something for everyone here and we want to make sure that not only do people have a safe, fun time, but that that really important contributing part of our economy continues to thrive.

AF: Given the experience of a major bridge having to be closed because of structural integrity issues, what is your vision for investing in infrastructure, particularly now that cities might be looking at a different framework from the federal government?

BS: Part of the story of the Washington Bridge on I-95, which is a major artery here in the city—it’s a state-owned bridge and a Rhode Island DOT-funded project—was inadequate maintenance. The lesson I draw from that is the importance of ongoing maintenance to avoid the much bigger price tag that comes for replacement.

We need to make sure that we’re all taking care of this infrastructure, particularly after four years of significant investment in some real big infrastructure projects here at home and all around the country. Secondly, we need predictable revenue to be able to pay for these projects [such as user fee tolls on heavy trucks]. You can repair it today or replace it tomorrow, and the replacement is always the worse investment.

AF: Similarly, are you worried about the health of the “eds and meds” anchor institutions, which continue to be a critical component of the Providence renaissance, amid the disruptions in federal funding?

BS: I’m very worried about the financial stability of the eds and meds. The change of the indirect cost recovery for NIH grants is affecting Providence already. Both our hospitals and our primary research institution, which is Brown University, depend on those funds. To change the rules of the road midstream is hugely disruptive.

Our largest employers are the hospital and the colleges. It will find its way into our community one way or another with these cuts, whether it’s job losses, depressed real estate values, diminished investment. And all of the good things that might not come as a result of this—the cures to diseases that may not be discovered and solutions to real problems none of us get to benefit from, if the research never happens. It’s a real problem and a real shame. It’s no way to treat really critical partners.

AF: You’re a different kind of politician compared to some past leaders in Rhode Island who might be described as more old-school. How would you rate yourself in terms of engaging with constituents? In a recent interview, you said, “There are times when public leaders need to say, pencils down, we’ve heard enough. This is what we’re doing.”

BS: I think about things in two ways. One is around priorities, and the other is around style. With respect to priorities, I didn’t know him, but the late Boston Mayor Tom Menino talked about being an urban mechanic, [and that] has always been a phrase that resonated with me. I’ve tried to set my priorities on core quality of life issues, things that impact people’s daily lives, and try to make them better. Just try to fix the problems that people actually care about.

I think there’s going to be a huge erosion in trust in government in general. The antidote to that is to show competence and efficiency and effectiveness, particularly at the local level, because our residents know us by name. They’re not shy to tell us what they think isn’t working well. I try to stay focused on those things and not on solving all the world’s problems, but solving a neighborhood’s problems.

In terms of style, I’m a pretty low-key person, and I don’t have high highs, I’m not bombastic, I try to listen to people. We do a lot of community engagement. We’ve tried to do community engagement in some new ways [like Zoom and online surveys]. There does come a moment where the leader just needs to make a decision and move on. That’s what I got elected to do. I’ll be on the ballot again next year. If the voters of Providence don’t like it, they can pick someone else.

I feel like it’s my job to say, “Okay, we’ve heard everyone’s feedback. We’ve made modifications where we think it makes sense. We can agree to disagree on other things. This is what we’re doing moving forward and the day of accountability is election day.” I’m entirely comfortable with that. I think that’s what it takes to get things done. That’s what I think our residents actually want us to do, is to get things done. Inaction is the enemy of progress. It’s something I don’t want to fall victim to.

Anthony Flint is a senior fellow at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, host of the Land Matters podcast, and a contributing editor of Land Lines.

Lead image: Mayor Brett Smiley. Credit: City of Providence.