Nearly two dozen neighborhood and community partners are pledging their support to help engage residents in the Participatory Budgeting Grand Rapids process. Participatory budgeting is the process that allows community members to help decide how to spend parts of the city budget.
The Participatory Budgeting Grand Rapids Committee or PBGR recently announced that it has formed partnerships with non-profits in all three City wards to encourage outreach and engagement.
The selected partner agencies, which align with the PBGR Committee’s vision and goals, will perform outreach to their members and respective districts. Their goal will be to collect ideas and increase PBGR voter participation especially among those residents in underrepresented communities. Outreach to encourage idea brainstorming and submittal will be performed in various traditional and non-traditional ways.
Outreach could include, but is not limited to, community meetings, online town halls, social media posts, and door-to-door and face-to-face engagement.
PBGR steering committee member, LaKiya Jenkins says, quote, “Participatory Budgeting is a community led process. We’re excited to partner with several known and respected community organizations to ensure we’re including, not just those that are normally at the table for these types of conversations but also, the residents whose voices might typically be overlooked.” End quote.
Some of the partner agencies include the Baxter Neighborhood Association, Disability Advocates of Kent County and Linc Up among others.
