This post is part of Animating Democracy’s Inside Artist-Municipal Partnerships blog salon. Check out upcoming posts from the Metropolitan Area Planning Council’s (MAPC) Jenn Sien Erickson (Jan. 24) and MAPC’s first Artist-in-Residence Carolyn Lewenberg (Jan. 25); plus six others published in 2018.

A few years ago, the District of Columbia Office of Planning (DCOP) launched an ambitious local government creative placemaking initiative. DCOP designed a multi-year, multi-neighborhood effort that would build community in areas experiencing rapid change. Supported by the Kresge Foundation’s Arts and Culture Local Systems Program, “Crossing the Street: Building DC’s Inclusive Future through Creative Placemaking” used arts and culture to activate space, foster conversation, promote inclusive experiences, highlight neighborhood assets, and advance planning.

Since 2010, we had been experimenting with various creative placemaking approaches, framed in early iterations as temporary urbanism. The Arts and Cultural element in the city’s 2006 Comprehensive Plan provided the basis for a follow-up study on DC’s creative economy to support creative employment and business opportunities throughout the city. While completing the Creative DC Action Agenda in 2010, we engaged curators to do a digital lab and several retail pop ups—dubbed “temporiums”—where local entrepreneurs could showcase and sell their work. With the support of ArtPlace America, we coordinated with the local arts and development community to host arts and cultural temporiums in four neighborhoods.

Fast forward to 2015. While DCOP had developed some experience in this field, the Crossing the Street platform provided an unprecedented opportunity for us to think at a much larger scale and more intentionally about how arts and culture could bring communities together. We envisioned this platform as a way to implement and inform other planning efforts, particularly the Comprehensive Plan and DC’s first Cultural Plan. From Kresge’s perspective, it was also about testing the integration of arts and culture within other sectors. For the outside observer/partner, however, the announcement of Crossing the Street yielded many questions for DCOP. Why is a city planning agency using arts and culture as part of its planning practice? Who are these projects for? Why are curators and artists leading these projects? Initially, answers to these questions were not clear, but as each placemaking project progressed through completion, and as we tested out new approaches, answers began to surface.

What became apparent as we embarked on this journey with curators, artists, and communities was the impact that an artist-municipal framework could have: planners began to think like artists, and artists began to think like planners. We also had not fully accounted for the unique lens, approach, and connections that artists make when working in a community. There are many lessons learned from our Crossing the Street, but we will focus on two distinct areas: 1) a new way to engage community; and 2) systems change. Inherent to both areas was a single underlying facet: the role of artists-municipal partnerships.

Engagement. A core function of any planning department is community engagement. DCOP used Crossing the Street to test a new engagement paradigm: artist-led. We learned early on that artists and creatives engage community differently than a traditional planning approach; inherent to their practice is the ability to build trust, catalyze new voices, and foster community excitement. Simply put, planning agencies can be more effective in their efforts when artists are helping lead certain types of difficult conversations about neighborhood change. Crossing the Street proved this. Through our placemaking work, we realized that artists, as part of a local planning process, can help expand how government communicates with its constituents.

Systems change as an adjective, noun, interjection! The change happened in many ways and levels. We call this the “3 Ps.” 1) Procurement & Grants administration. To move forward with the Request for Applications, we had to re-think our grant administration template so that it would allow for a more open-ended request to be issued that was more akin to an arts agency issuing a call for curators than the typical project-based approach an agency such as DCOP takes. 2) Personnel. The program had profound effects on the work programs, skillsets, and interests of staff in the agency. We involved staff from across the agency in brainstorming creative placemaking project ideas (through an agency event, staff pitched placemaking ideas) and helped manage projects. The program also culminated in the creation of a new position at DCOP that focuses on strategic partnerships and projects. 3) Planning. The program not only introduced but embedded creative placemaking in the work that OP does as an agency. We used the program to pilot recommendations from area-based plans and to test out ideas for the Cultural Plan and innovate our engagement practice.

Looking ahead. How does a city planning agency sustain the creative placemaking momentum and partnerships? We are poised to enhance our partnerships with the arts and culture sector throughout the city. In 2018, we developed a new tool, the DC Public Space Activation and Stewardship Guide, which daylights best practices and strategies that support cultural expression and consumption in public spaces. We are finalizing a Cultural Plan that lays out a vision and recommendations on how the government and its partners can strengthen and invest in the people, places, communities, and ideas that define culture within the nation’s capital. And we are embedding creative placemaking in the changes we are making to our Comprehensive Plan. As we begin 2019, DCOP looks forward to continuing its partnership development with local artists to celebrate and recognize arts and culture across the city, and help the District build community and grow inclusively.