State of the Cities 2023

In its 10th year, the State of the Cities report explores U.S. municipalities' most urgent challenges and their leaders' main objectives and strategies for improving the quality of life of their residents. To answer these questions, the authors examined data extracted from State of the City speeches given by mayors from a sample of U.S. cities, census data on U.S. cities and sentiments of residents in cities across America.The five sections of the report focus on the top five themes that emerged from the annual mayoral speeches: Infrastructure, Budget/Management, Public Safety, Economic Development, and Housing. For each theme, we provide an overview of the main topics discussed by the mayors, as well as some examples and statistics that illustrate their perspectives and challenges.