I would like to announce the creation of a new group on Daily Kos: Vallejo 21st Century Infrastructure Projects. Nicknamed, eVallejo, this enterprise will attempt to influence the direction of governance in Vallejo by involving the community in the process of creating their own digital future.
Visit the eVallejo website!
It is my hope that sharing the process of creating eVallejo with everyone on Daily Kos may motivate others to attempt to do the same in their communities. Lets get started beyond the fold.
The starting place is the acknowledgement the untapped reservoir of empathy in the community around us. Vallejo is fortunate that some of the ground work to mobilize the community empathy has been done by the "participatory democracy" elements contained within the expenditure of Measure B funds on the PB-Vallejo process in 2013 and 2014. See: Participatory Budgeting - City of Vallejo Website.
PB-Vallejo uses a process that brings together members of our community in discussions of how to solve community problems. In the two years that I have been involved in these processes the most common comment I have heard, paraphrasing, is: I really enjoyed meeting new people different than myself, I learned they have similar love and concern for our community.
This "participatory democracy" element was replicated by the Vallejo Planning Commission in the job of updating our Vallejo General Plan. See: Street Prophets Coffee Hour - Vallejo General Plan Update - Part 1 and Part 2.
It is processes like the above that allows for citizens to develop an empathy for their fellow citizens and the principal of a community coming together to help each other. This was one of the principals I suggested be adopted into the General Plan.That the City of Vallejo has the right to own and operate enterprises that benefit the citizens of Vallejo. And that these enterprises should by design foster citizen involvement.
This brings me to the 2014 eVallejo PB-Vallejo project submission I made online to the Vallejo Open City Hall website: Digital Ambassador Corps. If you read the proposal you will see community involvement is key to the success of eVallejo thus echoing the theme of "participatory democracy."
I will continue to post to this group as things develop.
JON