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Participatory Budgeting (PB) can be a good idea.
Quote: Flipping the Power Structure – The People’s Budget is a form of participatory budgeting that puts residents in charge of how the city spends its money. The United Nations considers participatory budgeting a democratic “best practice” and the New York Times called it “revolutionary civics in action”. Participatory Budgeting has been used in over 3,000 cities around the world.
Are more residents paying attention to local government? Sounds fun, let’s do this!
Why is the City doing the People’s Budget?
- Empower community members from all parts of the Redwood City/North Fair Oaks community to be heard!
- Improve City government transparency and accountability through the direct allocation of public funds
- Advance equity and civic inclusion by proactively seeking out residents who have traditionally been less heard in civic processes
[Source: RedwoodCity.org]
The project’s focus was on “Equity and Inclusion.” That is why the hardly visible Equity and Inclusion Officer got involved as well. According to her, the projects needed to benefit a large portion of the community and be a one-time expense. Apparently, “a walking trail, new park benches, a decorative mural or a major clean-up effort in a certain part of the city could all fit the bill.”
So far, so good. It still sounds like a fun little project, and something good could come out of it. Certainly, a little more civic participation in city government really couldn’t hurt. So, let’s also keep an eye on the part that says “advance civic inclusion.”
Projects suggested by The People
As mentioned before, people were asked to suggest projects. City hall then sorted some 700 ideas and suggestions coming from maybe 500 residents into the following categories:
- transportation
- jobs & economic mobility for adults & teens
- housing & home improvements
- household skills & tools
- community activities & communication
- business and entrepreneur support (all bilingual English/Spanish)
- public safety
- mental health support
- kids & teens activities and classes
- school support
- roads and sidewalks
- public art
- homelessness services & basic needs
- outdoors and recreation space
- green energy & sustainability
Were those projects any good?
Many of these 700 ideas sounded too fleeting, too temporary to make a difference (a subsidy here, a small grant there, a learning class for a few). There were way too many projects that sounded like the city manager copied them off her own to-do list: ‘Conduct Sea-level Rise Assessment’ or ‘Add funds to City Housing team budget’ or ‘Water trees for 1 year’ or ‘Organize trash pickup’. Many of these projects already sounded like they should be part of the General Budget.
There were definitely a few pearls in there. Anything benefiting children, including adding outdoor fitness equipment, water refill stations, and BBQ grills in various parks, micro mobility chargers, including for wheelchairs or knee scooters, community vegetable gardens, and art installations, basically anything with staying power lasting longer than four weeks.
Since the city motto is “Transportation, Children and Youth,” a Traffic Safety Learning Garden would have shown that the city is serious. And you can never go wrong with Community Gardens. Unfortunately, those were not the winners.
… and the winners are
500 residents sent in 700 different ideas. It seems weird that out of so many solid projects, City Hall chose these “winners”:
- Free showers for unhoused community members ($250,000)
- Add funds to the City Housing team budget ($250,000)
- 10-week youth peer mentorship program for drug and alcohol prevention ($40,000)
- El Camino Real bike lanes (3 blocks) ($460,000)
None of these winners seemed to fit the description. All sounded like they were or should be part of the General Budget already.
We talked about the problems with the bike lanes last week. They were promised for many years, voted on many times before, and even budgeted through various other projects along El Camino Real. City hall already spent millions of dollars on studies, surveys, EIRs, and staff hours with basically nothing to show for. And this time around, they spent maybe $20,000 in paint to create a fine 0.2-mile-long loading zone for Amazon trucks and claimed that the project cost them $460,000 in bicycle funding. And yes, let’s not forget that an astonishing $170,000 of those $460,000 was used to buy a “Protected Bike Lanes Sweeper” for non-protected bike lanes. I’m pretty sure not one resident asked for it, and not one resident would call it a great idea in 3-year hindsight.
The other projects don’t sound more real either. Anything ‘unhoused’ is in the jurisdiction of the county. The city housing team should already be fully funded during the yearly budgeting process, if the city really values Equity so much. A mentorship program for drug and alcohol prevention should be done in every school for every student. The County Office of Education and San Mateo County Health have plenty of community organizers on staff and funding to provide that already. As has Redwood City Together.
Minimum Effort – Maximum Advertising Power
The drama and theater of essentially buying a new Protected Bike Lane Sweeper and working down a few more items on the city hall to-do list was still one of the more entertaining projects over the last few years.
The project was supposed to start and finish in 2022, but it lasted until 2025. By stretching the same project out over 3 years, they could keep the same $1M on their website and in the news cycle. This could give the impression to some that the project was regarded as a success. Equity and inclusion are important to the council, and City Hall values civic engagement.
“If this pilot is a success, hopefully we’ll be able to try it again in the future.” [Equity and Inclusion Officer Briana Evans]
But if the council really liked the “People Budget 2022,” it would have been finished in 2022 and reborn as “People Budget 2023”. That never happened, which, of course, means the pilot was regarded as a failure. By 2023, City Hall must have regarded equity, inclusion and civic participation as unimportant. Rather than giving another $1M to the people or equity and inclusion in 2023, the city manager preferred to waste that money. She bought new $1M expensive Hermann Miller furniture at a time when hardly-used office furniture was all the rage. In fact, the city manager announced a $318M Capital Improvement shortfall and still found it more prudent to buy $1M office furniture for staff that wasn’t even coming to the office, than give it to another People Budget project or Capital improvement infrastructure.
This is a wild guess, but I don’t think the People’s Budget was ever supposed to succeed. The city manager never liked this project in the first place. The city council brought on the idea. A People’s Budget means that $1M is taken from her decision process and given to commoners. People in power never like to give away power like that, and certainly not to the common people. And that is really why The People’s Budget won’t return to Redwood City.
There was no “The People Budget 2023.” There was no “People’s Budget 2024”. There will be no “People’s Budget 2025.” Not by this council. Not by this city manager.
City hall might not have liked the project or taken it too seriously, but they sure milked it as much as humanly possible. The city manager stretched it out over three years. They even used the program, which she didn’t like very much, and applied for the All-American City Award, which the city didn’t win.
The award, typically given to 10 communities each year, celebrates and recognizes neighborhoods, villages, towns, cities, counties, tribes and regions that engage residents in innovative, inclusive and effective efforts to tackle critical challenges. [nationalcivicleague.org]
It would have been ironic if Redwood City won an award for public engagement in the year they shut down public commenting per Zoom.
Conclusion
The death of The People’s Budget 2022 would indicate that the city manager and the city council—under longtime members Diane Howard and Jeff Gee—don’t care about equity and inclusion or civic engagement anymore. Certainly not since 2023.
If City Hall really wanted the People’s Budget to work, here are a few recommendations:
- Pre-select infrastructure projects that have a long-lasting effect: a walking path, outdoor exercising equipment, playgrounds, green spaces, etc.
- choose people-centric items and stay away from car-centric projects (improving downtown sidewalks: yes; installing neighborhood speed humps: no)
- narrow the voting list down to 10 understandable projects (weave in one or two art projects too).
- don’t shut the project down while in parallel applying for an award.
- don’t shut down public commenting via Zoom.
No one believes the city’s fear of antisemitic Zoom bombings while council members are openly supportive of an Elementary School being named after Henry Ford – America’s most notorious Anti-Semite – either. If the city wanted more civic engagement, it is high time to bring back public comments on Zoom – many other cities never backed down or surrendered.
“Democracy thrives when all residents are active and engaged in the policies and decisions that shape their lives. These finalists are breaking down barriers to meaningful youth participation and enacting programs that are creating equitable and thriving communities.” [National Civic League]
More Information
- The People’s Budget
- The Participatory Budgeting Project
- The World of Traffic Gardens
- 2023 All-America City Award finalists
- RWCPulse: The People Budget 2022
- PADaily: $500K for office furniture
- RWCPulse: $1M for ergonomic furniture
- SMDaily: The time is now to stop glorifying Henry Ford
