“We’re a bunch of numbers geeks.”
That is Andrew Ramlo’s nutshell description of the folks at Urban Futures Inc., which Ramlo founded in 2001 with prominent Vancouver-based demographic and consumer behaviour researcher David Baxter.
Urban Futures has grown into a leading pulse-taker of the demographic and economic issues that affect Canadian communities.
But Ramlo is quick to separate Urban Futures from the pollster pack.
“Polls don’t dig down into the details about how things change and, more importantly, why things change,” said Ramlo.
Urban Futures is the private-sector sister of the non-profit Urban Futures Institute, which Baxter founded in 1996.
The institute’s singular client is the general public.
Its key goal, through the detailed reports it releases about once month, is to spur conversation about public policy and about why and how Canadians live, move and communicate the way they do.
Ramlo began working for the institute in the late 1990s after obtaining a bachelor of arts in urban and economic geography.
After returning to university to obtain a master’s degree in planning in 2000, he recognized the opportunity for the institute to subsidize its own research with fee-based work.
Today, the incorporated Urban Futures, of which Ramlo is executive director, counts numerous municipalities, provincial governments and developers among its clients.
“It’s really been the best of both worlds, being able to work on the non-profit side getting better information out to the public and cross-subsidizing that work with fee-based work,” said Ramlo.
Considering that Ramlo almost failed Grade 6 math, it’s a little surprising that Statistics Canada relies on him to interpret and convey the results of their surveys and findings for the media and general public.
“Math was something I loved to hate in school,” said Ramlo. “I was a late bloomer.”
His other roles with advocacy, community and public policy groups in B.C. have solidified his reputation as one of B.C.’s most prominent demographers and planning consultants.
He has held a council position with the Planning Institute of BC and is currently an advisory committee member with the Vancouver Foundation, assisting with the development of the Vital Signs for Metro Vancouver indicator program. •
