Some suggestions, in no particular order, of a list that’s only a sketch:

Recognize the truth of the city, and all cities. This small town is filled with thousands upon thousands of smart, knowledgeable people. I don’t say this to make others feel good; I say it because it’s true.

These many don’t need the management, guidance, and approval of city officials to do good things – they’ll do more good on their own than when under a bureaucrat’s thumb. It’s arrogance or ignorance to think otherwise.

Regulate less. We should stop telling people what to do, with what they’ve earned, and with what they’d like to build. Officials aren’t more knowledgeable than those taking these risks, and they’re not the ones taking these risks.

Stop leading with regulations. If the city must regulate, and to some small degree it must, it should avoid leading with news of regulations. A litany of warnings about where one must not park, where trucks may not go, what fines residents may incur, how quiet one must be, should not be the introduction to life here.

Don’t lead with regulations; lead with rights and opportunities. Emphasize what’s allowed and possible, not what’s prohibited.

Smart, successful people will not relocate to a place where hectoring mediocrities badger residents day and night about the importance of coloring within the lines.

Address the danger of vacancies and emptiness. Other than a brothel, nothing is worse for a business district than empty storefronts, abandoned factories, and vacant lots.

‘Nothing’ is far worse than ‘something.’

Just as customers recoil from stores with half-empty shelves, so do new businesses shy from broken-down, empty city blocks.

Success builds success; abundance creates abundance. Both success and abundance come from an initial position of the liberty to use one’s talents to their fullest.

Be candid about problems. Americans admire politicians who acknowledge their mistakes. A child’s excuses are no substitute for candid admission of municipal errors. No one outside of a small collection of back-patters believes these rationalizations anyway.

Tackle real problems in big ways. Whitewater has chronic and spreading poverty among children. Divert future spending from empty projects to local anti-poverty initiatives. Spending in the city should be on public safety and care for the needy and vulnerable — not a dozen other projects and schemes.

Working on a project like this won’t tarnish Whitewater’s image – it will enhance our image as a compassionate and honest city that cares about all its people.

Stop exaggerating. The best way to improve the city’s reputation is to do the right things, not simply to insist that everything looks good, and is wonderful, in a supposedly micropolitan dreamtown.

It’s a bad habit, both embarrassing and borne of weakness.

Sound principles and good policies are the best marketing. The easiest way to advertise, brand, market, or represent something is to have something good to advertise, brand, market, or represent. It’s not what officials say, but what people actually see, that’s believable.

Encourage individuality.

Embrace and advertise the beauty of our multi-ethnic city. One of our greatest strengths is that we are a multi-ethnic city. Proudly declare as much – that we are a place for all people.

There is no general, better, more humane arrangement for our city than one of free markets in capital, goods, and labor. To argue otherwise is no more reasonable than to argue against a natural law of gravity.

We should welcome people of all kinds, from all places, to live here.

Embrace an American heritage of individual liberty, limited government, free markets, and tolerance. Forget about advancing some silly, reactionary vision of Whitewater in opposition to the grand and beautiful vision America offers all people.

American principles are better than a false, stodgy local exceptionalism.

Stop deriding students as though they were Visigoths. Without the university, Whitewater would be tumbleweeds from one end of town to the other.

The university has had many fine accomplishments that are commendable; the day-to-day presence of so many people living here is no less to our good fortune.

Consider the best order a spontaneous order. What people build on their own, working together privately and without a central authority, is more creative and valuable than a bureacrat’s scheme.

Strive to meet true national standards. Stop pretending about national and international awards for city projects, awards that are utterly worthless, when there are teams and athletes in the city — and so many other people — who have actually won national championships and true honors.

Allow people to experiment. New businesses, new art, new music, new and genuine innovations– they won’t come under government’s shadow, but free of that influence.

The best ideas will be those we’ve not yet considered.