Hi there, my name is Abbey Judd and I work for the nonprofit Civic Arts. And this is Art Nerd City Nerd Podblog. That's right. A combination of a podcast plus a blog. After you listen to the podcast, you can follow up on our website at www.civicarts.org, where we have lots of great content to help expand on today's podcast.

The Art Nerd City Nerd Podblog series is about creative placemaking, which is the practice of using arts and culture strategies to support equitable community development. We'll be talking about how folks like you, artists, arts organizations, community members, or local government staff can serve your communities in innovative and creative ways. Cities all over the country are looking for new tools to address community problems and challenges, and creative placemaking is an opportunity to equitably address those issues.

Civic Arts is an arts and urban planning consulting firm. We envision a world where arts and culture are fully embedded in the way we build our towns and cities, and we're all are invited with their full selves to our civic spaces. On today's podcast, we're going to be talking with Civic Arts founder and executive director, Dr. Lynn Osgood. She'll be sharing about some of the foundational aspects of creative placemaking and how the field has developed over the past 10 years.

Abbey Judd: On today's podcast, we will continue our conversation with civic arts Founder and Executive Director, Dr. Lynn Osgood. And today our topic is community engagement. In our last few episodes, we talked about how creative placemaking projects come together, and how that might differ from the way a typical local government project might happen. Now that we have a better understanding of what makes these projects unique, Lynn, can you help us really think through some of the nitty gritty, the larger ideas around community involvement embedded within creative placemaking practices?

Lynn Osgood : Hi, Abbey. Thanks. Yeah, I think you've hit on a really important point, because I think in essence, everything in creative placemaking work points back to the community. Yes, it is with artists as partners and artwork is produced with and through it. But But ultimately, those are pointing to community. And, and and I think this shows up in the way that one of the foundational values around creative placemaking work is centered on equity, and about helping cities achieve their equity goals. And then it's also about it, I think it's also embedded the pointed community, it also points to the capacity, these artspace strategies to bring really new and innovative ideas to the table. Because when you're in partnership with many people, including the communities you're going to come up with, with new and grounded ideas. And I think it points to in creative placemaking. We also talk about how these practices hold the potential for creating change within within departments and organizations, not just externally but internally. And and what we've seen over the last few years is that projects or cities working with these approaches, actually, you know, when community voices are brought in and truly integrated into the system, the system starts to shift in response. And in really wonderful in positive ways. I always think of the example of the Fargo project in North Dakota where you know, their deep work with the community over five years. And the ability to keep pivoting in response to what the community was saying, actually gave them as the planning director said that the muscles they needed to respond when the COVID pandemic hit, because suddenly city staff was in this position of having to pivot and pivot and pivot and pivot again. And the work that they had done for five years with the artist was exactly developing those muscles, listen to the community, understand something newer and deeper and shift and do it again, and understand something newer and deeper and shift. And so they had been going through that for years. So when the pandemic hit, they were actually ready. And so I think, you know, when we think about these community involvement practice practices in communion in creative placemaking. You know, I think what's what's really important to remember is that is that their potency lies in the fact that they have been much further upstream.

When you say upstream, do you mean up more upstream in the community? Or can you elaborate a little bit more of what you mean by upstream?

Yeah, that's a good question. I think when I think when I say upstream, I mean, upstream in the project process. And, you know, and I, and I think to to, to really understand that we actually need to look a bit back at history, to understand you know, what our community engagement processes are now and where they come in the process and And and to start with, I think I think it's really important to remember that community wasn't always thought of as even necessary in local government decision making practices. That's, you know, that's within the past half century, there was the view earlier on that decision making processes were carried out by professionals prefer learned professionals who had expertise, and therefore were the ones that should be making the decisions. And you know, and there's a long, long history of this type of orientation within our society at large, if you go back to the 1800s. And earlier, if you wanted to know something about what was happening, same with farmers or town, folks, you would never go to them, it was assumed that you would go to the community leaders to ask, and that could be a pastor, that could be a banker that could be a man or Lord. But it was assumed that someone would speak for them. And it wasn't actually until the early 1900s, when the social sciences began developing, and new techniques of really finding out information, quantitative information, qualitative information, that people started to have not only the desire, but the means to start going out and talking to residents directly. So you can think back to some of these very, very early surveys that were done when people were trying to understand about the living conditions of the urban poor when they were living under very oppressive forces of early industrialization. And, you know, it was huge problem within the city, and people were trying to understand it so that they could solve it. And, and this was just when the social sciences were coming on board. So they were able to harness this idea of going out and talking to people one by one to find out what their indirect experiences were, that was radical. And, and in the, in the local field of local government and in planning. In particular, it really wasn't until the 1960s, that that a large and really radical shift began to happen in the ways that professionals approach their product or practices. It was up until that time planning for towns and cities was really viewed as the domain of experts in urban design, and and experts that usually came from the architecture profession, and I should say, and we should name it was usually white males. It was not actually until the impact of urban renewal hit, that things really shifted.

Can you remind us again, what urban renewal is? And was?

Yeah, and I think that's a that's actually that's a great question, because it is like it is that there are still some urban renewal projects that are projects that happened under that banner. But back in the 50s, and 60s, there was a huge push for urban renewal projects. And it was it was framed as these efforts when municipalities would would pursue land redevelopment projects, in order to as they said, address Urban Decay and blight within cities and create more opportunities for housing, usually higher end housing and businesses. The problem was, no one ever asked the residents of the areas that were demolished. If they thought that they themselves were, quote, unquote, blighted, or even worse slums. And, and so what ended up happening was that wholesale destruction of vibrant and vital neighborhoods, particularly neighborhoods of communities of color, entire areas were raised huge freeways were run through them, it was incredibly aggressive development, and at the expense of the poor. And as you can imagine, it was incredibly traumatic. So in the wake of this, and of many urban design moves that followed in the wake of these actions, cities and and, and professionals within cities began to wake up to the fact and I have to say thanks to the work of community leaders who made sure they learned these lessons, that that people weren't involved in the basic decision making processes that impacted their lives. And so there began to be this radical shift and resolve within local government just really within the span of a decade, that practices needed to change and change, change quickly and change strongly and that people needed to be asked directly about those choices about their choices.

Hmm, yeah. For the overarching, like Shadow of urban renewal is just so strong in so many communities and I think lingers in a lot of understanding of what the role of city processes can be. And I've heard the term Negro removal also used interchangeably with urban renewal and It, it kind of brings up that point that I think where your work is that is how do how can we work with artists to kind of help in this process of community engagement? And what is their role is? Is it bringing in people to help within the decision making process or building that trust? What does that look like?

Yeah, that and I appreciate you like, zeroing in on that, you know, like it. So is this about decision making processes? And and I think of it sort of in a good improv way, it's a it's a yes. And answer. That, yes, working with artists and culture bearers can absolutely bring people to the table for decision making processes that, you know, are parallel to standard processes. But I think the real power of artspace practices is not that they replace earlier ways of doing public participation, but they in fact, address a blind spot.

And what do you mean by what sort of blind spot within that practice? Like, what, what is that blind spot?

It gets, it gets at that blind spot that, um, you know, right now, we have many good community engagement processes, really good community engagement processes that are solid, and really do help people walk through decision making processes of, you know, where's the curb cut going to happen? And how much budget should we allocate, it's the sticky dots and the post it notes, those have their place. But I think what this what these practices point to, is that there's some really important work that needs to be done earlier on or upstream, as we were saying, because if you can imagine the way typical city projects happen, and like, and one thing to hold up is that what cities are really good at, is bringing things to scale, they can build entire transportation systems, they can build libraries, they can build, you know, support school systems. So they they move quickly, they do big things, and they do them in a way that they hope is efficient and transparent. And so within that you can imagine, you know, a project process, you know, what maybe a bond package is, is, is brought forward, say and voted on. And, and so that passes, and now there's this big project on board and RFPs are written and service providers are contracted with and brought on board and, and then there's lots of internal meetings that are had to decide on the scope and the scale and the direction across the project. And then and then later on down the line. The community is brought in to help with specific decisions. And that that's great. Yeah, they're at the table. But I think creative placemaking practices ask, and what artists are really good at is bringing people together early on in the process and and informing those relationship, trusting relationships, and really figuring out questions like, what is community all about? How did they understand themselves and their challenges? How do they understand their own needs. And so it's not the kind of information that's needed. later on down the line. It's, it's the kind of things that you need very early on. And at the same time, it's that investment in and support of the relationships that that everyone knows are deeply needed to have helped help a project happen to be successful.

So sounds like you're sharing that artists really helped build that trust and deepen relationships, then a community process and kind of turn, turn the script around, at least from how we've traditionally understood community engagement processes and public processes together. So where do you see the starting where there are first steps with this, this work with artists and with community members and community engagement?

Yeah, I think there are a few first steps, I think, you know, like after, so assuming that you you know, you've found an artist that you're excited to work with, and you're moving forward. One of the first steps that I think of I actually I borrow from the work of the Center for performance and creative practice. They're an organization, an organization with roots in community theater, who helped municipalities work with artists. And one of the first things they asked local government departments to do is actually to slow down down. And and that's it, you know, when you're changing when you're shifting processes, that's a really good thing to do so, so they asked folks to take a deep breath and and to ask themselves some key questions about how they're approaching a particular project. Um, so some of the questions that they asked that I love, just revolve around the basic task of listening their questions like, you know, what, what is listening mean to you? Where and when, and how does your organization your department most frequently Listen, not only externally, but internally. And questions like, what do you you yourself need to see, to believe that you were listened to by someone else? And? And so and with that, how will you make listening to others visible to them?

Oh, wow, those last two questions, what do you need to see to believe you are listened to by somebody else? And how will you make listening to others visible to them? Those are two really kind of inner locked, really powerful questions. Wow.

Yeah, I think and I think that's it, that it's that it is about, that's where the the magic that the artists can can help bring to the table because not only are they there, facilitating engagement processes, you know, and artists are amazing storytellers, they have an amazing ability to like to hone in and focus a topic in a way that's really clear. I was, I was once speaking with a photographer, and and she was talking about artists ability to help a community really focus on an issue. And she said, you know, in my training as a photographer, I was trained about what she called the punctum. anomaly. punctum is a place on a photograph where your eye is just automatically drawn in, in that place that it's drawn, it helps you understand the larger hole. And so so there's something about the artistic training and process, that that not only brings people to the table, but really deeply engage in meaningful ways while they're there. And, and I think that that's one of the most important things is that, you know, it's, it's not only the fact that artists are creating something, the what that they're creating, because it could be a mural, it could be performance, it could be a song, that's really, really important. But what and that's, I think that answers that that last question of like, how do you know when you've been listened to? And but, you know, at the same time, they're going to help you in that process of how that listening transpires? And, and I think city staff and you know, you know, like, and we're urban planners, you know, we think of like, how do we understand when we've been listened to in municipal processes like, well, you're going to see that in a press release, you're going to see that in a report, you're going to see that in a, in a in a plan or, or presentation to Council. And I think these practices ask us, because that's the way the community needs to hear it. And is that is that the way that that deeper relationships with the community are formed. And so so what the what artists bring to the table is, it's just a new way of working, and one that works in parallel to traditional processes.

So it sounds like thinking that larger dimension of community involvement, creative placemaking projects are thinking upstream in a really critical way. But alongside community processes or city processes that we're familiar with, and really adds another dimension to those that's gives a different perspective, or vantage point that is frequently missing, or what that blind spot we, you were talking about a moment ago.

Yeah. And I think that's it, I think you hit the nail on the head, because it's these, it's these processes that come alongside. And that that I think is another key dimension to to recognize, particularly for local government staff to realize is that working with artists is not just about setting up a provider and setting up like, here's the engineer, they're gonna figure out all the loads of the bridge, and they're going to help get it constructed. You're just going to manage the process as it moves project as it moves along. along you will be managing the project most likely or working with an intermediary organization like, like an arts organization to help you. But the key thing is, you are in partnership with the artists and I think that's one of the key things that people can forget, you know, you sort of want to hire the artists, have them do the mural, get set, go. But really what's about is that going back to those listening questions, Because what you want to do is you want to co create a process, you this is not just the artists bringing their talents to the table, this is the artists bringing their talents to the table in relationship to you as a municipal professional, you know how these plans get made, you know, the sausage factory, the the the that is there in the background, and the political processes and the landmines, the artists need to understand that they don't have a background in that. And so as you're figuring out processes, it needs to be a deep collaborative effort. And, and so I encourage people that when when you bring the artists on board, look at that scope of work, work on that scope together, and have moments where you can actually share your thoughts on things like, how will we know when we're successful? Because I think, you know, artists will bring one dimension of that equation, like the they might bring things you might share ideas, like the community's really been heard, the artists might bring ideas that are foreign to, to to local government processes ideas, like, well, I'll know when we, when we really hit on the truth of this community. That's what language we use. But But and then in return, you as staff you need to share to them. Um, yeah, you know, that's great. I love that all know that this is successful, when we can actually pass this on Council, and get something done in the community. And so, so I just need you to understand, you know, artists, that artists partner that eventually we're going to be in front of counsel making a PowerPoint presentation. And they're going to ask us about the number of people that were involved, who was involved, what processes we use, how we how we legitimate these processes, and, and just share that share the inner workings of how these things come together so that the artists can bring their knowledge of their inner workings of their professional practices in together. And this is I love these conversations is like it's together that you figure out okay, how is this all going to come together now. And and you actually start devising processes, both at the same table. And so and it's an it's an, it's an incredibly fertile conversations, and then, and then you go out to the community, and then you start engaging in these new ways and in ways that, you know, when they happen and when they connect, are not only going to create impacts for the project, but they're probably going to create impacts for the department. And, and just the way that we do our business as usual. So I think that that's, that's the that's the beauty and the inherent strength that artists really bring to the table.

Wonderful. Thank you so much, Lynn, thank you for adding the dimensions of community work and community engagement and and this magical field of creative placemaking and really bringing it into some concrete ways for us to all engage and have a conversation today. Really appreciate it.

Thanks, Abbey

This series of episodes is in partnership with engaging local government leaders in our creative community cohort. Learn more at civic arts.org