Series examines how region's history continues to shape metropolitan Chicago.
CHICAGO (AUGUST 27, 2026) – By the late 1980s, broader economic and political shifts had a profound impact on the Chicago region. As federal investment in local and regional affairs waned, many cities across the country had turned their attention to civic groups to support regional efforts. In Chicago, despite the deindustrialization of the prior decades, many of the traditional financial and industrial corporations remained influential figures in Chicago's political sphere. A number of corporate headquarters shifted from the central business district in the city towards the suburbs. Through the Commercial Club of Chicago, a long-time elite group of Chicago business leaders, influential members of the corporate and financial sectors became interested in regionalism and began to forge relationships with the City Council.
Globalization and the shift towards a more information-based economy also had a drastic impact on the city. Mayor Richard M. Daley, who took office in 1989, championed Chicago's emerging position as a global city. He continued the city's relationships with civic groups, which had begun under Mayor Harold Washington is, and formed strong partnerships with Chicago's elite industry leaders. Together, they envisioned pathways towards enhancing Chicago's attractiveness to large multinational corporations and small corporations who could be incubators for innovative enterprises.
In the years that followed, the Chicago region experienced a period of economic prosperity. Under Mayor Daley, the city benefitted from enhanced green spaces, parks, recreation, cultural, and transportation facilities along the lakefront. Unemployment was down and economic opportunities were abundant across the region. However, the concentration of economic activity in the region had shifted dramatically; whereas the majority of the region's population and job opportunities had been focused in the city in 1970, by the beginning of the 1990s, the majority of the region's population and economic opportunity had shifted towards the suburbs. The geographic boundaries of the region, with no natural barriers other than Lake Michigan to the east, continued to expand outward, resulting in environmental degradation and loss of open space. Rapid development of primarily single family housing produced a mismatch between affordable housing and job availability, with many of the new job opportunities only accessible by private vehicle. Excessive travel produced congested traffic and air quality concerns, as well as increased costs related to transportation infrastructure. Existing social and racial disparities in the region, the legacies of policies several decades earlier, deepened even as the region as a whole experienced prospered.
At the same time, in 1990, the State of Illinois' legislature shifted politically, sparking Whereas Chicago Democrats had dominated the state's political affairs for years, redistricting following the 1990 census led to suburban Republicans taking control of the state legislature, leading to a number of punitive actions against the City of Chicago which severely impacted the city's ability to add new developments and exercise its influence in Springfield.
The Creation of the Metropolitan Mayors Caucus: A COG of COGs
In early 1997, Mayor Daley hired Rita Athas, the former executive director of the Northwest Municipal Conference, to be the Director of Intergovernmental Affairs at the city. Her role was to help manage relationships with suburban constituencies regarding the proposed expansion of O'Hare airport, a project which the city strongly championed as a way of increasing Chicago's global status. The suburbs were extremely divided on the prospect of expanding the airport. Communities which were closest to O'Hare strongly opposed its expansion, citing concerns for noise pollution and flight paths which would impact their local quality of life. Communities in the south suburbs, which had suffered from decades of economic disinvestment, advocated for a separate airport to be constructed in the south of the region, with the hope that it would bring additional revenue to the region.
The meetings surrounding the airport sparked an initial relationship between the suburban COGs and the City of Chicago. By the end of 1997, the Northwest Municipal Conference and Mayor Daley hosted a joint meeting to discuss how the city and the suburbs could continue to work together to promote the region's shared economy. This 5-hour meeting led to the development of the Metropolitan Mayors Caucus.
The Mayors Caucus began as an informal group representing all of the regional COGs and the City of Chicago. In the early years of the Caucus, the City of Chicago staffed meetings and provided support for shared initiatives. Meetings were typically held in person. COGs could bring their Directors and up to 8 mayors representing their region. Mayor Daley attended all meetings. There were often social gatherings afterwards, which built trust and camaraderie among representatives from diverse corners of the region.
In its early years, the Mayors Caucus formed spontaneous task forces and committees to address shared issues which came up in meetings. Some of the early initiatives which they focused on were advocating for a regional strategy on clean air, providing advocacy on electrical deregulation legislation, advising a regional economic development plan, and advocating for affordable housing.
By the early 2000s, the Caucus had hired two full time staff persons to focus on housing initiatives and environmental initiatives. Through its 501(c)(3) status, it was able to secure funding from private foundations to provide subgrants to member municipalities. Its strength was its capacity to foster consensus by giving mayors from diverse corners of the region a forum to engage in dialogue withoug
Developing a Shared Vision for a Regional Economy: Metropolis 2020
Metropolis 2020 emerged as an outgrowth of the Commercial Club of Chicago's increased interest in regionalism. The Club, a long-established, invite-only club of Chicago's elite business leaders, published a report titled "Metropolis 2020," in 1999, which highlighted the need for a regional approach to economic development and infrastructure to prepare it for the twenty-first century.
The Metropolis 2020 report underscored the need to make the Chicago region an attractive place for a global economy, arguing that a strong regional economy would help make other regional goals, such as improving the socioeconomic conditions of all Chicagoans, more attainable. The original report faced backlash from the Metropolitan Mayors Caucus due to a lack of consultation with suburban mayors, prompting the mayors to produce a counter-report detailing the issues they saw in the plan.
Mayor Daley helped to facilitate dialogue between the Commercial Club and the mayors to align their visions for the region. This ultimately led to the creation of a nonprofit organization, also called Metropolis 2020, dedicated to implementing the report's recommendations. The organization was designed to be short-term, focusing on timely and focused implementation. Its board was composed of primarily high-level business people, in addition to one religious leader, three suburban mayors, and one union leader. The organization was supported by the Commercial Club as well as foundation grants. It staffed four senior executives who were retired but powerful and well-connected individuals who volunteered their time to support the initiatives of the plan.
Although the organization was intended to last only 10 years, it extended its operations through 2011 to contribute to the celebration of the 100th anniversary of urban planning in Chicago. By the time the organization dissolved, it had helped push for major state legislation in the areas of criminal justice, transportation, early childhood education and housing.
Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning
One of the initiatives which Metropolis 2020 and the Metropolitan Mayors Caucus jointly advocated for was the consolidation of NIPC and CATS. They argued that having two separate planning agencies, one which handled land use and one which handled transportation, was ineffective. They instead pushed for state legislation to designate a central metropolitan planning agency to streamline and enhance regional planning efforts.
In 2005, Metropolis 2020 and the Mayors Caucus succeeded in securing state legislation for the creation of the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning (CMAP), a new metropolitan planning agency for the region. CMAP became both a state-authorized regional planning agency and a federally designated metropolitan planning organization. Its state status allows it to produce comprehensive regional plans for both land use and transportation. Its federal status allows it to allocate federal transportation funds and lead transportation planning.
Importantly, CMAP was the first regional planning agency with buy-in from suburban leaders across the metropolitan region as well as the civic and business community. It became an important anchor for both dimensions of metropolitan Chicago's regional approaches, with representatives from both the business and civic community as well as the regional COGs on its executive board. CMAP's close relationship with the Metropolitan Mayors Caucus and suburban municipalities was reinforced as the two organizations came to share an office together.
While CMAP still does not have any regulatory capacity, recent research has demonstrated that it has had a positive impact on encouraging regional collaboration in the region (De Leon-Alejandro, 2015). One of its strengths has been its ability to provide support for communities within the region which do not have the capacity or funds for infrastructure or environmental issues (Planey, 2023, p.966), promoting more of an equitable approach to regional planning than was possible with the previous planning agencies. CMAP has also become a trusted agency, known for its data-driven approach to regional challenges.
In 2010, CMAP published the region's first comprehensive plan, "GO TO 2040," which established a comprehensive strategy for the region addressed various planning priorities, emphasizing inclusive economic growth and regional integration.
Looking Ahead
The greatest legacy of the 1990s through early 2000s was the institutionalization of what began as informal relationships in the previous decades, thanks in large part to the entrepreneurial vision and skillful relationship-building of Mayor Daley and Rita Athas. The process that produced these institutions required sustained negotiation between the City of Chicago and suburban municipalities that had long been skeptical of city-led initiatives, between Councils of Government with divergent development and governance priorities, and between the Commercial Club's regional economic vision and the Mayors Caucus's emphasis on consultation and consensus. The result was a durable institutional infrastructure for regional coordination with distributed ownership, diversified funding, and enough organizational depth to survive leadership transitions and political shifts. The degree to which that infrastructure could be turned toward the region's most pressing challenges — environmental, economic, and social — would become the defining question of the decades ahead.
About The Author
The series draws on two years of research by Katie Friedman, whose study of collaborative governance in the Chicago metropolitan region, recently published in 2025 in the journal Urban Governance, traced 75 years of regional institution-building across three distinct historical periods. Katie is currently a Program Manager with the Center for Equity, Effectiveness and Efficiency (C3E) and brings nearly a decade of experience working with local governments in the Chicago region.
Blog Series:
If you missed Part 1 & 2 of the Governing Through Change blog series, read them here:
