Navigating the World of Neighborhood District Councils!

Navigating the World of Neighborhood District Councils!

Adam Yust

11/15/2014

H i , I ’ m A d a m Yu s t !  I was born here:

 I used to work here:

 I Live here:

 I now work here:

“…partic’pation is a process, not a structure. The City has a responsibility to develop a process that will ensure that everyone has the opportunity to communicate with City government, and further that everyone is assured that they will be heard. This process cannot guarantee that there will always be agreement nor is it a substitution of one level of government for another or any other transfer of power.”

Formal definition of community participation as adopted in 1975 by the Saint Paul City Council.

Congress

Democracy Neighborhood District Councils

There’s an Elephant in the room…

2 Different Cities

2 Different Systems

Saint Pizzle

Saint PAul  17 formalized district councils  Adopted into city code since 1975  Each district council operates as a independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization  Each council provides advisor y recommendations to the city council  All district councils receive some amount of funding through the City of Saint Paul

The Minneapple

Minneapolis  80 residential neighborhoods, 70 established neighborhood organizations  Earliest founded over 100 years ago

 Neighborhood organizations function as independent nonprofits

 Neighborhood organization budgets run from $2,000 annually to more than $500,000  All neighborhood organizations received funding through the Community Par ticipation Program and the Neighborhood Revitalization Program

The Issues

Sometimes you have moments like this‌

This is what my district council looks like:

White

Non-White

Millennial

Non-Millennial

Homeowners

Renters

Fort Road neighborhood in Reality  21% of people are non-white  27.4% of people are 18-34 years old  51.4% of households are renters

Why Does This Matter? Take the Issue of Cars‌

The West 7th Fort Road Federation was asked to take a stand on new city regulations

 New Regulations: Maximum of of f-street parking would change from a mandate of 1 .5 of f-street parking spaces to 1 .25 of f-street parking spaces per unit  Small change, big impact

 Future development of city at stake

 Car culture vs. transit oriented development

Millennials and Cars  Census data shows that the share of 16 to 24 year-olds traveling to work by car declined by 1.5 percentage points between 2006 and 2013  Young people aged 20 to 30 are less likely to move from central cities to suburbs  Millennials consistently report greater attraction to less driving-intensive lifestyles — urban living, residence in “walkable” communities, and openness to the use of non-driving modes of transport — than older generations.

Me vs. everyone else

This is what it feels like

Are you going to be your Neighborhood’s David?

The Future is how

The Future is how

Thank You Adam Yust ajyust@gmail.com @mplStp