When budget season comes around, it can be hard to feel good about policy wins when there are so many other important causes that are also fighting for funding.
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The next smallest step for your community doesn’t always involve changing a street’s design or making housing policy reforms. Sometimes, it’s as simple as asking questions and probing the thoughts of local leaders.
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When it comes to saving the world, there’s a limit to what top-down policies can do.
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Too often, people who offer seemingly simple solutions for problems in their community just get dismissed by municipal staff. Here’s how to persist.
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Rapid villainization is easy; grace for city staffers and elected officials is the harder path.
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At a glance, the sales tax is a nearly invisible revenue source that is also a cash cow. Yet, for local governments, it is the most distorting of taxes. Here’s why.
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City hall is an institution with a diversity of responsibilities serving your community, and in it lies an opportunity to observe how your local city operates and is managed.
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This public toilet in Winnipeg, MB, is a case study in why city governments need to pay attention to the power of small bets.
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Cities don’t need to pay for or try to create arts and culture programs. They just need to remove barriers to and support the organic culture already existing in their neighborhoods.
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To save our cities, we need to try new ideas, and that’s scary. But sometimes we must make scary decisions if we’re ever going to move into a stronger, more resilient future.
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Many of us are keen to express the “what” that we’d like to see in the built environment, but unwilling to think rationally and clearly about the “how.”
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Many local governments have taken on a “the customer is always right” mindset, but that’s simply not the best approach, especially for decisions that should be made at the block level.
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You should be wary of anyone who claims to speak for “the community” or “the public,” especially when it’s in lieu of telling you who will benefit from the actions they support.
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If you ever wanted to REALLY make a change in your town, instead of just starting a fight, consider this your manifesto.
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What the debate over a historic building—Wichita’s Century II—can teach us about local democracy and government.
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Here are the immediate steps every community should be taking to respond to the pandemic.
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Last week we released Nine Things Local Government Needs to Do Right Now in Response to the Pandemic. Here’s the next step for a strong recovery.
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Here are the immediate steps every community should be taking to respond to the pandemic.
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Being a small business owner, especially in a smaller town, can give you an up front look at how local government works… and at what’s not working as well as it should. Here’s an interview with one strong citizen who’s hoping to take what he’s learned to City Hall.
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