“If you look at American society today, building trust is probably one of the number one things we should be focusing on. The flip side of helping people to build trust in their local government is helping local government officials and elected representatives to also trust the people that they’re governing”

Listen to this incredible conversation with Wyatt Gordon about Participatory Budgeting in Richmond!

Wyatt is a born-and-raised Richmonder with a master’s in urban planning from the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa and a bachelor’s in international political economy from the American University in Washington, D.C. He is an urban planner, journalist, and community organizer working to foster safer, more sustainable cities and greater civic participation in local government.

He currently covers transportation, housing, and land use for the Virginia Mercury.  He also works as a policy and campaigns manager for land use and transportation at the Virginia Conservation Network.  Wyatt is a proud Northsider you can find walking, biking, and taking the bus all over town.

Wyatt is a wealth of knowledge about PB, and shared many words of wisdom about how this process should unfold, from the very practical explanation of what can be funded through PB:

“It has to be something you can kick,”

To the profound insight that,

“In our city we have a lot of policy experts who may not have any type of degree in what they’re working on but they live in that neighborhood so they know exactly why the current configuration of that intersection isn’t safe, what needs to be done to change it. They know that people don’t feel comfortable letting their kids play at that playground because all of the lights at the playground are off so when it gets dark, it feels scary.”

Listen for more great ideas about how PB should be implemented, and what it could fund in Richmond!

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