Chicago’s $1.3 Million Experiment in Democracy
Alternatives to Political Systems, Community Projects, Eco-Villages, People Systems, Society, Urban Projects, Village Development — by Yes Magazine May 27, 2010
For the first time in the U.S., the city’s 49th Ward lets taxpayers directly decide how public money is spent.
by Josh Lerner, Megan Wade Antieau
On Chicago’s far north side, citizens are taking democracy into their own hands. Through the first “participatory budgeting” experiment in the United States, residents of Chicago’s 49th Ward have spent the past year deciding how to spend $1.3 million in taxpayer dollars. Over 1,600 community members stepped up to decide on improvements for their neighborhoods, showing how participatory budgeting can pave the way for a new kind of grassroots democracy, in Chicago and beyond.
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