Readout: Dallas Mayor Eric L. Johnson’s Final Day at the World Economic Forum
On Thursday, Dallas Mayor Eric L. Johnson spoke on a panel and engaged in high-level meetings and events as part of his final day at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
In the morning, Mayor Johnson attended a session titled “Country Strategy Dialogue on Mexico.” The session featured a conversation about Mexico's transformative business and policy strategies with senior government officials – the Governors of the Mexican states of Baja California, Sonora, and Yucatan – and Enrique Perret, Managing Director of the U.S. Mexico Foundation. Mexico’s Undersecretary for Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights, Joel Hernandez Garcia, kicked off the session and highlighted Mexico’s significant infrastructure investments during the last year. Garcia said these investments will create more than 200,000 new jobs in Mexico. Mayor Johnson also engaged in a conversation with State of Sonora Governor Alfonso Durazo Montaño – who discussed his aspirations for Sonora to become the Silicon Valley of Mexico – about partnering with Dallas-area universities on semiconductor research.
After this session, Mayor Johnson met with Thomas M. Siebel, Chief Executive Officer of C3 AI. During the meeting, the two discussed how enhanced public safety data collection, fusion, and usage could improve public safety outcomes in Dallas.
Lastly, Mayor Johnson spoke as a panelist in a session titled “Decongesting Cities.” The session focused on how the surge in consumer and business dependence on urban deliveries in recent years – which has led to more delivery vehicles on the road – has raised concerns about quality of life and congestion.
Mayor Johnson shared that Dallas’s key to success has been that the municipal government views the city’s residents and businesses as “the stars of the show.” The mayor said that the city government’s job is to facilitate success, not to impede on the lives and consumer behaviors of residents and visitors. However, he added, the top priority of city government is ensuring the safety of its residents, including the safety of drivers, pedestrians, cyclists, and others on the streets.
“Every mayor’s job, whether they know it or not, is to make their city as fun as possible without making it unsafe for people,” Mayor Johnson said. “We want to keep people safe and let them enjoy themselves. That’s the goal.”
In addition, Mayor Johnson discussed Dallas’s traffic corridor studies, the city’s investments in upgrading traffic signals, the city’s goals in its Comprehensive Environmental and Climate Action Plan (CECAP), and efforts to make Dallas streets, intersections, sidewalks, and neighborhoods more pedestrian-friendly.
The full session can be viewed at this link.
In total, Mayor Johnson spent four days at the World Economic Forum, which is a premier annual gathering that brings together global government officials, non-governmental organizations, economists, business titans, entrepreneurs, civic leaders, journalists, and others to discuss crucial international issues and share ideas and solutions. At the Forum, the mayor represented the interests of the City of Dallas and Dallas Fort Worth International Airport.
Mayor Johnson is scheduled to leave Davos on Friday to return to Dallas.
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