Author: Steven Clift

Thank you for your donations! Every amount counts as our community engagement online returns to participant-supported mode.

We ended the year with 263 donors contributing $9,180 to help us maintain the forums and provide user support. Thank you for helping make that happen. We want to extend a special thanks to our newer friends in Framingham. Your support is truly outstanding.

Having just completed a participant survey in the Twin Cities, we’d like to give a shout out on the feedback we received:

“Being informed and aware of what is going on has made me feel safer and more connected.”

“I think one of the biggest things the Neighbors Forum does is help you when you’re looking for a service. We discovered a new mechanic who we are extremely happy with thanks to the forum. Same goes for our plumber. It’s great to hear the different suggestions and experiences folks have had.”

“The forums keep me up to date on the issues of the city, especially the controversies that people want to talk about. They’re the best place to learn about what is going on with proposed developments, vacant lots, city ordinances that impact the neighborhood.”

Sometimes the forums inform and generate action:

“I attended several forums/community meetings because of the Neighbors Forum.”

“We were able to get the word out about National Night Out and had lots of participation from the neighborhood.”

“The city parks department was going to tear down a bunch of trees and make a parking lot in our community and the neighborhood forum announced it and organized a group to make our voices heard and we were successful in stopping their actions.”

“We used the forum to help spread the word about the privatization of a local recreation center and got over 100 people to attend a meeting with officials. This stopped the process and allowed us to set up a community task force to discuss what a partnership would look like.”

“We used forum to organize group to care for Hamline Park – ‘Friends of Hamline Park’.”

“I sent an email to the list to explore ways neighbors could work together to make their homes more energy efficient. Several people responded and as a result, a group of us met several times during the year and several homeowners did energy efficiency home improvements. We are continuing this energy efficiency work now through the District 10 Environment Committee.”

And we heard how the forums help us keep in touch with our humanity:

“A local neighbor with a lot of history died recently and her funeral was announced on the forum. I believe many more people came than would’ve otherwise. It was a great time to catch up with old friends, meet new ones, and learn some fascinating neighborhood history.”
“I love just seeing neighbors looking out for each other. There are a lot of things about lost pets, crime watch, etc. that shows me that everyone is looking out for each other.”

“The reuse opportunities have been very valuable. When a neighbor took down a chimney, we were able to salvage them to better our property. They saved on hauling away costs and we saved by not having to purchase landscape materials.”

“One of my friends who is getting older needed some help with heavy things, and he found a young person through the forum who was happy to help him. He didn’t know where else to turn.”

“I was able to get many perennial plants for the teen program I facilitate at a homeless shelter downtown.”

As E-Democracy charts its course into the future, we’re looking for more and better ways to activate volunteers, starting with a monthly evening conference call. Would you be interested? Please email contact@e-democracy.org.

We appreciate your contribution and look forward to staying connected into the future.