A look back at PB cycles past, with lots of hope for PB cycles future. Give your PB project ideas for this year before the end of the year. 

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Dear John

Ten years ago, when we launched Participatory Budgeting in NYC, I hoped it would help energize our local democracy by providing new pathways for people to get involved. A decade later – at a time of urgent need to strengthen trust in government – I’m just as hopeful. No, actually, more so: because I really believe that under the stewardship of incoming Council Member Shahana Hanif, PBNYC is going to thrive in ways we couldn’t even imagine then.

Now it’s your turn to help: Idea submission for the current PBNYC cycle ends on December 31 ([link removed]) , so if you have yet to share your ideas for how to solve a local problem or make our community even better, please visit the PBNYC website ([link removed]) . You can learn about PB, suggest ideas ([link removed]) , support or comment on other ideas, and even sign up to volunteer ([link removed]) !

(Look, I know the current Omicron wave is really dampening spirits; it’s got me down as well. But several of last year’s winning PB ideas – like the Brooklyn Diaper Project and the new Kensington farmstand – grew out of mutual aid work in response to Covid-19. They show how the spirit of PB can help us recover from the pandemic, stronger and more inclusive.)

Last week, I had the pleasure of dropping into my last PBNYC neighborhood assembly as your Council Member. Although this one was virtual, the discussion brought me back to past cycles and neighborhood assemblies going back a decade to the beginning of PBNYC.

How it started… How it’s going


So I wanted to share a few of my favorite projects over the years

Park Slope Library
Storytelling Garden

Park Slope Library’s Storytelling Garden, conceived and brought to life by Friends of Park Slope Library, and where Knuffle Bunny now sits.

Bus Clocks

Thanks to PB funding, there are now
countdown clocks at bus stops
throughout the district. And the MTA
caught on, and put them on the
subways, too.

Source: Bklyner


PS 130 playground

The new PS 130 playground was not only funded through PBNYC. It was also designed by a class of first graders there, making it the most participatory playground in history!

Endale Arch

PBNYC funded many projects in Prospect Park, from the Kensington Dog Run to 9th Street Dog Beach to the gorgeous restoration of the historic Endale Arch.

Women’s Self-Defense for the Resistance

Workshops for immigrants,
Muslim women, and their allies focused on
self-defense techniques, physical
empowerment, healing and justice,
and financial literacy.

Brooklyn Diaper Project

Three diaper hubs stationed throughout District 39 as part of a pilot project to help families in need gain access to diapers in New York City.

Across the past decade, an amazing array of people have led the way to make participatory budgeting in our district a genuine model for civic engagement and community-driven decision making. Our District Committee, facilitators, delegates and volunteers make the process happen year-in and year-out. I want to especially call out and thank a few District Committee members, like Jason Boutin, Caron Atlas, and Christa Paterline, who have provided PB leadership across the entire decade! And our remarkable PB Youth Committee (shown here along with Council Member-Elect Shahana Hanif) has taken extraordinary leadership to energize grassroots democracy far into the future.

It has been my honor and joy to help build PBNYC into a citywide, participatory democratic process. And it’s now my honor and joy to hand it off to one of its staunchest advocates – incoming Council Member Shahana Hanif.

Shahana’s deep belief in the radical potential of genuinely inclusive democracy – where young people, women-of-color, her Bangladeshi Muslim neighbors in Kensington, and every single one of us feel encouraged and empowered to participate, knowing that our voices can be heard, that we take real leadership together, and that our shared ideas are far better, more inspiring, and more supportive than what we could do alone – shines through in all her work. I really can’t wait to see how PBNYC flourishes under her leadership.

Of course, this is not actually goodbye to PBNYC for me. I’m still a District 39 constituent, after all. So watch out for my project ideas next year!

For now, though, please do all that you can to keep each other safe and well, submit your PBNYC project ideas for this year before December 31st ([link removed]) , and stay tuned for Cycle 11 vote week – starting March 26, 2022!

Brad


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