Today, Eugenie Birch and Susan Wachter, co-directors of the Penn Institute for Urban Research (Penn IUR) announced that Dr. Camille Cates Barnett, formerly Managing Director of the City of Philadelphia, will become a Penn IUR Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania. With support of a William Penn Foundation grant to Penn IUR, Dr. Barnett will research best practices and innovations in urban governance, as well as pen articles on those topics and guest lecture in Penn IUR’s undergraduate urban research colloquium.
 
The theme of the articles and lectures would be in best practices in transforming local governance.
 
In addition to writing and lecturing based on her past experience and the research she will conduct at Penn IUR, Dr. Barnett will also draw on national input to help design an award for innovation in governance in the Greater Philadelphia region.
 
Birch said of Dr. Barnett’s new work at Penn IUR, “The Penn community and the wider Philadelphia region are fortunate to have the wisdom and experience of Dr. Barnett applied to identifying city and regional issues and privileged to have the support of the William Penn Foundation in this important set of projects. We are looking forward to a fruitful and invigorating partnership with her.”
 
Dr. Barnett is a professional city manager, an active advisor to public sector leaders, and a frequent speaker and writer on emerging issues of leadership and governance. Most of her years in city management were in Sunnyvale, CA; Dallas; Houston and Austin, TX; Washington, D.C.; and Philadelphia.  Under the Nutter administration, she was instrumental in the implementation of the city’s 3-1-1 non-emergency call line and the PhillyStat data-collection system.  Dr. Barnett holds a Ph.D. in public administration from the University of Southern California.

Additional information about Penn IUR is available at http://penniur.upenn.edu/.