By Jim Clark

For the third time, the City of Somerville has been named All-America City by the National Civic League. The city has previously held the title in 2009 and 1972.

The Somerville delegation competed to be one of 10 All-America City Award winners in Denver Colorado from June 12-14. Other cities chosen for membership this year are Carson, California; Salinas, California; Stockton, California; Tallahassee, Florida; Tupelo, Mississippi; Geneva, New York; Marshall, Texas; Spokane, Washington; and Yakima, Washington.

The All-America City Award is America’s original community recognition award, honoring communities of all sizes where community members, government, businesses and nonprofit organizations work together to address critical local issues.

To win, communities must demonstrate close and effective collaboration among the public, private and nonprofit sectors to identify and advance the progress of key goals shared by the community. Other criteria include recognition and inclusion of the diverse segments of the population in community decision-making, creative use of community resources, and clear demonstration of project results and impacts, among many others. The finalists are selected on the basis of extensive written applications submitted in March.

The National Civic League, based in Denver, is a 120-year old nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to fostering and sharing promising practices of local government and public engagement and celebrating the progress that can be achieved when people work together. One of its best known programs is the annual All-America City Award program.