By Jocelyn Bogen
February 14, 2011

The United States Conference of Mayors and Waste Management has launched the mayor’s race for the honor of calling themselves a 2011 City Livability Awards Program Award winner, with a wide range of programs eligible. Application and guidelines have been mailed to mayors of cities of 30,000 or more.

“For the past 32 years, the City Livability Awards Program has been one of the most competitive programs sponsored by The U.S. Conference of Mayors. Each year, hundreds of mayors and their city governments submit applications with a wide range of programs to compete for the honor of calling themselves City Livability Award winners. I would like to thank Waste Management, Inc. for their two decades of support in honoring and giving national attention to mayoral excellence. And it is through this partnership that we are able to continue to salute the mayors who have developed innovative and successful programs that improve the quality of life for city residents,” said Conference of Mayors President Burnsville Mayor Elizabeth Kautz.

For the past 21 years, Waste Management has partnered with the Conference of Mayors to honor mayors and their cities for outstanding programs that contribute to the quality of life of their citizens. Waste Management Chief Executive Officer David Steiner added, “Waste Management is committed to finding innovative and better solutions to provide our communities and customers with valued environmental services they seek. We continuously strive to bring value to our customers and extract the highest and best value from the materials we manage, and invest in technologies that improve the services we provide. In doing so, we also seek to minimize our environmental footprint and that of our customers. The City Livability Awards is a reflection of our values and commitment – identifying new and innovative ideas that make our communities better places to live in.”

Participating cities will submit an initial application of 500 words, due April 8, which briefly describes their program, and indicates when and why it was created, how it has improved the quality of life of the community, and why it is outstanding or innovative.

From these initial applications, about 20 finalist cities in each of two population categories will be selected. These finalist cities will then submit a more detailed application, due April 22. An independent panel of judges will select the winners in May. Award winners will be announced in June at the 79th Annual Conference of Mayors in Baltimore.

The 20 City Livability Awards are presented in two population categories – ten awards to cities of less than 100,000 people; ten for cities of 100,000 or more.

Every municipality in the United States is eligible to nominate one or more city government programs in any policy area, regardless of whether the municipality has applied for or received a City Livability Award in previous years. All programs initiated by the city government are eligible, including those developed and implemented in cooperation with private sector and/or community group participation.