The following is a throwback to ULI Toronto’s Winter 2006 interview with Municipality of Clarington city planner and current ULI member Carlos Salazar.

The ULI team recently reached out to Carlos and asked him if he’d like to make any updates to the content of the interview so it would more accurately reflect recent developments in his life and career. As a result, portions of the original interview have been revised by Carlos.

Q: What do you do for a living?

A: I am a city planner and have been working in the municipal sector for almost 30 years. I have worked for the City of Winnipeg, the City of Greater Sudbury, and I am currently with the Municipality of Clarington.

Q: How long have you been a member of ULI?

A: I have been a member of ULI since 1987.

Q: Why did you choose to join ULI?

A: Back in the winter of 1984, I started to study for my Master in City Planning at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg. While doing research on land development trends in North America, I ran into an issue of Urban Land at the university’s library. I was surprised that the articles in Urban Land gave a broader perspective of the development process than traditional development and planning magazines. The articles balanced the development objectives with the need to improve our communities. After receiving my master’s degree, one of the first issues I negotiated with my first employer was a membership with the Urban Land Institute.

Q: What are the biggest benefits of ULI membership for you?

A: The two biggest benefits for me are research and networking. Any time I start working on a project I search the ULI for articles and publications on the subject. For example, here in Clarington we are working on updating our Official Plan to conform to the Provincial Growth and developing and Town Centre for Courtice, one of urban areas. For these projects, we have been reviewing the ULI’s Mixed Use development Handbook, the book on Place Making Developing Town Centres, and the related Urban Land magazine articles. My job also involves larger planning policy issues and the ULI’s reports from the World Cities Forum have been an excellent source of information and ideas about the innovations our cities will need to succeed in the future.

The other great benefit of ULI membership is networking. A few years ago, I attended the ULI Fall Meeting in Chicago. There, I met many municipal colleagues from Canada and the US, and it was a unique professional opportunity to learn how Chicago has become one of the great cities in North America. At ULI events, you learn from people who are making things happen, from mayors, to developers and community leaders to city planners. Now with the Toronto District Council, the number of networking and professional opportunities has expanded greatly.

Q: How do you plan to be involved in the Toronto District Council?

A: I have volunteered with the Program Committee; and I am encouraging my colleagues here at the municipality to become members and be more involved with ULI activities. Our planners, including myself, attend many of the events of the Toronto District Council.

Q: Why would you encourage others to become ULI members?

A: In addition to the research and networking opportunities, I would emphasize the need for lifelong learning. All of us are involved in one way or another with the quality of the built environment, environmental protection, and economic development. ULI bring us together so that we can continuously learn how to balance our different interests with the aspirations of our children for a better community, from the regional scale projects like power centers, downtown redevelopment, to seniors housing and the children’s playground in our neighbourhoods.