18th Annual Urban Leadership Forum

Join the Penn Institute for Urban Research (Penn IUR) for the 18th annual Urban Leadership Forum, with remarks by 2023 Lawrence C. Nussdorf Urban Leadership Prize winners. This year’s awardees include Steve Adler, Former Mayor of Austin; Manuel A. Alculete Lopes de Araújo, Mayor, Municipality of Quelimane, Mozambique; Eleni (Lenio) Myrivili, Global Chief Heat Officer at UN Habitat & Arsht-Rock and the Chief Heat Officer of Athens, Greece; and Sheela Patel, founding director of the Society for the Promotion of Area Resource Centres (SPARC).

The annual prize recognizes exemplary thinkers who have demonstrated the vision to revitalize urban centers, respond to urban crises, and champion urban sustainability in the United States and around the globe.

The event will be hybrid, with an option for attendees to join by Zoom. Boxed lunches will be provided to those attending in person.

Photo Credits: Rayhan Ahmed, Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, Mithail Afrige Chowdhury and Syed Mahabubul Kader.

About the Awardees

Steve Adler most recently served as Austin’s 52nd Mayor, term limited after completing his second term at the start of 2023. During his tenure as Mayor of Austin, TX, his top priorities included mobility, affordability, climate change mitigation and equity for all Austinites. Mr. Adler served as a Trustee of the United States Conference of Mayors, Past Chair of the Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization (CAMPO) policy board, Executive Board of Climate Mayors and Past Vice President of the National Council of Democratic Mayors. During his time in office, the City of Austin passed the largest mobility and affordable housing bonds in its history. He shepherded Austin through COVID with one of the lowest mortality rates in the country, less than half that nationally and in Texas. Focused on equity, the city raised its minimum city wage to $20 per hour, passed city-wide sick leave, and enabled second chance hiring protections. Mr. Adler helped launch and raise $500 Million to fund FindingHomeATX with a goal to reaching net zero homelessness in Austin after having achieved that status for veterans. The city continued as a world leader on climate change action. Mr. Adler received broad recognition for innovative leadership. Foreign Policy named him a Global reThinker and Living Cities included Mr. Adler on its list of 25 Disruptive Leaders (along with Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and author Ta-Nehisi Coates) to mark that organization’s 25th anniversary.

Manuel A. Alculete Lopes de Araújo, Mayor, Municipality of Quelimane, Mozambique has held the position since 2011. Mayor de Araújo’s extensive experience spans civil society, academics, business, and politics, and he is deeply involved in advocacy for issues linked to active mobility and climate change. He plays a key role within institutions such as United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG) as well as ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability, where he is a member of the Global Executive Committee and Global Co-Chair for Resilience. In 2019, Araújo was elected Deputy Chair of the National Council of the Mozambican Mayors Association (ANAMM) Congress. He also serves as an Executive Committee Member of Global Parliament of Mayors and an Executive Member of the Convenant of Mayors for SubSaharan Africa.

Eleni “Lenio” Myrivili is Global Chief Heat Officer to UN Habitat and the Arsht Rock Resilience Center, building heat resilience in cities around the world. Myrivili is senior advisor for urban heat and a senior fellow at the Arsht-Rock Center at the Atlantic Council. She is also a member of the EU Mission Board for Adaptation at the European Commission. Myrivili served as elected Deputy Mayor for the City of Athens as well as Athens’ Chief Resilience Officer and as Athens’ Chief Heat Officer. She also co-chaired the Resilience Cities Network Steering Committee. She holds a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Columbia University and was a tenured professor for over a decade.

Sheela Patel is a grassroots urban activist who has spent the last four decades working in partnership with vulnerable communities living in informal settlements, both in India as part of the Society for the Promotion of Area Resource Centers’ (SPARC) partnerships with Mahila Milan and the National Slum Dwellers Federation, and globally through Slum/Shack Dwellers International. On behalf of these organizations, Patel advocates especially for vulnerable women living in informal settlements, seeking a seat at the table in national, regional, and global debates about poverty. Recently, she has been working on the challenges of climate change and how they impact cities’ most vulnerable people, seeking to highlight their role as first responders to natural disasters and the urgent need to include urban, rural, indigenous, and other networks in a just transition to a more sustainable world.