University of Toronto: The importance of citizen led budgeting
PBP’s Josh Lerner delivered the keynote talk at the University of Toronto’s Big Cities, Big Ideas panel on May 5th, discussing the benefits, challenges, and possibilities of participatory budgeting. PB has been practiced in Toronto since 2001 through Toronto Community Housing, and more recently through City and school pilot processes. The panelists discussed how PB […]
Shaping Democracy through Teamwork
Passionate about amplifying the voice of Greensboro residents, Maddie Reed and Fanta Dorley from Greensboro, NC helped engage many people from all walks of life to improve their community. PB Greensboro launched as the first PB process in the south last year, August 2015, and has since become an engaging outlet for people to have […]
Highlights from "By the People" – Democracy Conference, ASU
Where better to talk about democracy in December than under the sunny, blue skies of Arizona State University (ASU) in Tempe, AZ? Researchers and practitioners from around the world converged on ASU for the “By the People” Democracy conference. The PBP staff in attendance were treated to three days of discussion about the current state and future of […]
Urban Justice Center Releases New PB Findings
We’re excited to read “A People’s Budget,” the Community Development Project (CDP) at the Urban Justice Center’s new report on the fourth cycle of Participatory Budgeting in New York City! CDP presents findings from PBNYC research and thousands of surveys that provide a comprehensive analysis of New York City’s 2014-2015 PB cycle. Compared to Cycle […]
15 Key Metrics for Evaluating PB
There are many ways to measure the impact of PB, but researchers in North America now have a shared language to evaluate and compare PB processes. Our friends at Public Agenda – the lead organizer for the North American PB Research Board – have worked with the board and PBP to develop a toolkit for […]
PB Buzz: Improving Participatory Democracy with New Technology
PBP Director Josh Lerner recently said, ”democracy has become the political version of kale; almost everyone says it’s good, but few want to eat it.” Following that notion, there’s been a lot of buzz recently about the potential for new technology to make participatory democracy more palatable–something more like kale chips, one might […]
Participatory Budgeting in North America 2014-2015: A Year of Growth
Download the annual report: [wpdm_package id=’10034′] Click below to read the report online:
MIT students roadmap 2 new PB tools
We would like to send a big thank you to the students from the Crowdsourced City class at MIT who have been working with their professor Sarah Williams to develop 2 new tools to make PB easier to implement. The “Live Assembly,” developed by Luxi Lin and Hayrettin Gunc helps manage data at in-person assemblies. The “Idea Factory,” […]
Democratizing Schools with Participatory Budgeting (June 4th Webinar)
WEBINAR: Democratizing Schools with Participatory Budgeting Date: Thursday, June 4, 2015 Time: 11am – 12pm (PST) Download the webinar slides [PDF] Schools and school districts operate large and complex budgets – often with minimal participation from the community members and youth they work to serve. But it doesn’t have to be this way! Join […]
All for Data, Data for All: Supporting PB with Community Data
Participatory budgeting (PB) puts decision-making power into the hands of community members, and all decision-makers need access to good data. PB participants increasingly use data about their cities and neighborhoods to research needs, develop projects, and make informed, equitable spending decisions. Maps, for example. Through PB, volunteers, often called budget delegates, meet in small committees […]
