Community Planning & Advisory Committee

Education is integral to building a Great City, and with the Downtown Denver Partnership’s mission of building a great city for all, providing a variety of accessible, high quality schools at all levels of learning is imperative.  Furthermore, I am a DPS parent! The Downtown Denver Partnership announced Kourtny Garrett as its President and CEO in January 2022. Garrett joined the Partnership from Downtown Dallas, Inc. (DDI), where she served as President and CEO for nearly seven years. With 25 years of experience in the development of livable communities, Garrett is fueled by a passion for cities.  Her expertise is rooted in building social, cultural and economic vibrancy, creating places for people that provide access and opportunity for all.  The mantra of her life and her work follows the great Jane Jacobs’, “Cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody.” While in Dallas, Garrett steered the revitalization of Downtown through a period that included more than $11 billion of investment, public-private partnerships that brought more than 40 vacant buildings back to life, and a steady rise in residents from just a few hundred to more than 13,000. Included in that work was integration into dozens of transformative developments in a facilitating role between the public and private sectors, convening surrounding communities, and urban design, connectivity and use plans.  She also led the creation and implementation of the community-based Downtown area plan, Downtown Dallas 360, which was twice adopted unanimously by the Dallas City Council (2007 origination; 2011 update) and involved more than 40 neighborhood organizations. Some of her most proud achievements include a decade-long process to create Downtown Dallas’ first public elementary school and establishing partnerships that led to the development of 5 signature Downtown parks and subsequent management of the spaces.  Prior to her work in Downtown Dallas, Garrett led community relations work for Children’s Health, with particular focus on hospital network expansion. Her career started in community relations, government relations and retail development at a then-new lifestyle center in Southlake, Texas. Garrett is a Marshall Memorial Fellow and an honorary member of the Texas Society of Architects and AIA-Dallas. She is a several-time honoree of many Dallas-based media awards such as Forty Under 40 (2009), 78 Women Who Make Dallas Great (2021) and Dallas-Fort Worth’s 500 Most Influential Business Leaders (2016-2021). In addition, her long-standing commitment to the Dallas community included roles on Dallas ISD’s Business Advisory Board, and the Boards of Directors of Children’s Health, the Dallas Regional Chamber and a list that includes several more public, non-profit and community organizations. Garrett has expanded her work nationally and internationally through research and participation in the International Downtown Association, German Marshall Foundation, Brookings Institute and the International Business of Cities. She has published through many of these organizations, working toward the health and vitality of city centers across the globe. Garrett, originally from Colorado, was selected to lead the Downtown Denver Partnership from over 400 candidates through a national executive search. She took the helm of the organization in January 2022. In Denver, Garrett is proud to sit on the Board of Directors of Visit Denver and the Advisory Board of the CU Denver College of Architecture and Planning. Most recently, she had the honor of serving as a co-chair of newly elected Denver Mayor Mike Johnston’s transition organization, Vibrant Denver.  One of her most proud moments since joining the Downtown Denver Partnership team has been the launch of “Together We Will,” a public health and safety initiative that mobilizes over 50 business and neighborhood organizations, along with social service providers, the City and County of Denver, RTD, the Attorney General for the State of Colorado and the U.S. Attorney’s for the District of Colorado. Garrett graduated Manga Cum Laude and with Honors with a Bachelor of Arts in Communications from Austin College in Sherman, Texas, and pursued a masters in Urban Affairs at the University of Texas at Arlington. She also attended the University of London while working at CNBC Europe.