ABSTRACT
Regional partnership is a form of interlocal collaboration at a regional level in which participating local governments voluntarily work together to achieve common goals. Regional partnerships include alliances for a specific policy area, regional councils, development boards, corporations, commissions, and so forth. The documentations that make the collaboration patterns formalized include articles of incorporation, memorandums of understanding, regional or strategic plans, code of behavior or protocol, and legislation. This entry introduces regional partnerships for economic development in U.S. metropolitan areas and answers several questions: What are these regional partnerships’ attributes? How do you define an organization as being a regional partnership? How many regional partnerships emerge from the collaborative patterns? What are regional partnerships’ impacts on regional development?
