If you believe San Francisco mayor Daniel Lurie, there’s no place better to live in the world than The City by the Bay. At WIRED’s Big Interview event on Thursday—not so coincidentally held in San Francisco—the mayor told global editorial director Katie Drummond that he’s absolutely convinced that anyone looking to rag on the city doesn’t know what they’re talking about. Still, Lurie said, if you ask San Francisco residents, 62 percent say that their city is headed in the right direction, compared to just 25 percent a year ago. Lurie said part of what’s going to help keep San Francisco on the right track is a commitment from residents. Past leaders, he said, “took San Francisco for granted,” thinking “we could just continue on, and our success would continue as well.” To make San Francisco resilient, able to weather economic changes and tech booms and busts, Lurie said, its leaders have to be “relentless in fighting for [their] city, standing up for [their] city, and welcoming people, saying, ‘We want you here, and we're going to create the conditions for your success.’”