2012 Civic Celebration
- 2012 Civic Celebration program (pdf)
- Executive Director Sean Kershaw's closing remarks
- 2012 Civic Celebration news release (pdf)
- Give us your feedback on the event
- Video: A tribute to Verne C. Johnson
- Video of Manhattan Apple Store construction
How can we involve citizens in generating solutions to public problems by using successful retail concepts introduced at Apple and Target? What role do imagination and innovation play in policy?
On Oct. 25, the Citizens League will be joined by Ron Johnson, CEO of jcpenney and the man behind some of the most significant retail concepts in a generation - as creator of Apple Stores and Target's upscale merchandising - to discuss those questions at our Civic Celebration, which will highlight 60 years of Citizens League impact through innovation.
"The world has become so partisan that people have opted out, putting our nation's future at risk," Johnson said. "The Citizens League offers a way to opt back in; a path to impact and influence that doesn't require partisanship. People need to be involved in public life, and it starts by joining the Citizens League."
Ron is a Minnesota native and the son of Verne Johnson, a former executive director and board president of the Citizens League. In these roles, Verne Johnson and his contemporaries involved citizens in generating innovative and seemingly impossible policy ideas that became reality during his tenure.
Ron will share lessons learned from his father and his own retail successes, and describe how, just as the Apple Store concept focused on the customer experience, policy design should focus on the citizen experience.
"Ron embodies the imagination, risk-taking, optimism, and entrepreneurship that we need to solve public problems. That he comes from a father that also exhibited these traits is not a surprise." - Sean Kershaw, Executive Director of the Citizens League.
We would also like to thank our corporate and individual sponsors for making this celebration possible:
| Civic Champion |
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| Civic Pacesetter |
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| Civic Leaders |
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| Civic Builders |
Goff Public, Gray Plant Mooty, Wellington Management, Claudia Dengler, Ward Einess, Kris & Rob Johnson, Matt Lewis, John Taylor, Tom & Arlene Swain |
| Civic Supporters |
CenterPoint Energy, Ecumen, Eugene J. McCarthy Center for Public Policy & Civic Engagement at Saint John's University, Minnesota Public Radio, Tom & Eleanor Crosby, Bill & Pat Kelly, Ronna Linroth, Jeff Peterson & Jill Catherwood, Thomas Pettus & Cecily Hines |
, the Citizens League Emerging Leaders Committee for sponsoring the after party, and our media sponsors: Ecumen, Haberman, Medica, Padilla Speer Beardsley, The Social Wendy Group, Thomson Reuters, and Weber Shandwick.
If you are interested in sponsoring this year's event please contact Cat Beltmann at cbeltmann@citizensleague.org or by phone at 651-289-1075.
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