The results of the Your Voice, Your Choice participatory budgeting competition are finally in! Back in February, neighbors across District 5 proposed small street and park-related projects, and through a series of evening meetings worked with the city to narrow the field to about 10 projects. Of the three in the Broadview-Bitter Lake Neighborhood, only one had enough district-wide votes to be funded for 2018: $90,000 for walkway improvements along 132nd near Broadview-Thomson Elementary School.This money will help address safety concerns along a busy street, and make it safe for kids to get to and from school, the library, and the community center. Getting enough votes for this project is no small feat. Neighbors had to spend their free time organizing, attending meetings, lobbying the city, and mobilizing votes through schools and other neighborhood groups. It is great to have their hard work pay off with city investments in our neighborhood! Final results are here.
For the rest of the projects, organizers will have to wait for another chance to get into the city budget, either through future participatory budgeting efforts next year, or direct outreach to the mayor and our D5 Councilmember Deborah Juarez. We encourage them to work with the Broadview-Bitterlake Community Council to keep the momentum on these projects, and work to make our neighborhood even better!