COLLEGE CORNER, Ohio — Cincinnati City Council embarked on a two-day retreat Friday — its first since 1996 — and laid out two seemingly incompatible visions for the Cincinnati of 2020:

        Cincinnati will stay true to its heritage, remaining as a beer-brewing, family-friendly town that honors its Porkopolis past.

        Cincinnati will become a more cosmopolitan city with eclectic neighborhoods, multi-lingual street signs, and a WNBA franchise.

        But those two visions don't have to be mutually exclusive, city leaders said.

        “Some of the things we want to keep about the city are also some of the things we need to change,” said Mayor Charlie Luken. “We talk about how family friendly we are. I would like to see the city become more ... cosmopolitan. What I mean is, more young people. More single people. More gay people. More Hispanic people.”

        Or, as Councilman Paul Booth put it, “a city where diversity is not just tolerated, but celebrated as a way of life.”

        The first day of the two-day retreat at Hueston Woods State Park was devoted to thinking the big thoughts about where the city is headed.

        Away from the daily business of city government and the noisy protesters who attend every council meeting, city leaders talked candidly about the racial and socioeconomic divisions in the city.

        “Quite frankly, I've never been anywhere else in my life where everything is an issue of race first,” City Manager Valerie Lemmie, a five-month resident of Cincinnati, told council members.

        “We don't celebrate people who don't have "traditional, middle-class American values.' I think much of what we talk about as racial tension is really about a clash of values.”

        Creating integrated neighborhoods — that are also stable, safe and clean — was a top priority Friday.

        “Neighborhoods are our greatest strength and, I think, our greatest weakness,” Councilman David Crowley said.

        Council members agreed that Cincinnati needs to keep the best parts of neighborhoods like Westwood, College Hill and Mt. Lookout, while also encouraging more neighborhoods like Mt. Adams, Northside and Clifton.

        And all those neighborhoods need to be more democratic, with a city government more responsive to the unique needs of each neighborhood, Ms. Lemmie said.

        Many council members agreed that the city's structure for allowing neighborhoods a voice at City Hall is not working.

        “Some of these groups aren't well-connected to what people in the neighborhoods want,” said Councilman Pat DeWine. “It's more what the five people who run the community council want.”

        Many of these ideas may seem abstract for a city with pressing issues. But Councilman David Pepper, who organized the retreat with the help of a grant from the Knowledge Works Foundation, said it's time well spent.

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