John T. Reuter
John Reuter has spent his life working and living in the West. Born into a Greek sheep ranching family, he grew up in a small logging town in Oregon, went to school at the College of Idaho, and now lives in Seattle.
While in college, he co-founded the Sandpoint Reader, a weekly arts and entertainment newspaper and later freelanced for regional and national publications, including the Washington Post. He continues to write a monthly column for the Spokane Inlander.
In 2007, he was appointed and then elected to be the youngest city council member in Sandpoint, Idaho’s history and then selected by his peers to be Council President.
John currently serves on the Board of Directors for Strong Towns and is a Strong Towns Fellow. He's particularly drawn to the notion that economic development is a community endeavor not just belonging to the planners.
Hear John interviewed on our podcasts:
Strong Towns Podcast (2014) |
It’s the Little Things (2019)
Hear John’s presentation:
Building stronger towns isn’t just about planning, engineering and development. We need to address questions about cultivating rich and abundant lives in our neighborhoods. How do we live out our values when so much of the built environment seems to be working against us?
Hint: even if you get a road for free, you still have to pay to maintain it.
What if to build Strong Towns, we don’t just need to think outside of our partisan political boxes, but stop thinking of them as boxes at all?
A recent New York Times op ed despaired that economic trends have passed rural America by. So isn’t it time for some new economic trends?
Housing policy is a difficult puzzle because we want it to accomplish so many competing objectives simultaneously.
Strong towns won't be built if residents see themselves as passive customers merely consuming city services.
Changing minds isn’t easy, but it’s one of the most powerful things you can do to make your town stronger. Here's how to get started.
Plus 5 tips for repealing parking minimums in your community.
We have built a system we can't afford. The proposed solution? Supersize it, so it's even bigger and less affordable. We can do better.
Medina, Washington is struggling to pay its bills. How can this be? And what does it mean for towns and cities that don’t have the two richest people in the world living there?