Good news – streets.mn is changing its mission.
Since streets.mn began in 2011*, we’ve had a value-neutral mission about “expanding and enhancing the conversation” around important and often-misunderstood issues like land use, transportation, and urban design.
At the beginning, this value-neutrality was set up deliberately. As an organization, we don’t want to have a clear positions about questions like “Is the Southwest Light Rail good or bad?” or “Will robot cars be great or terrible?”
Those are interesting questions, and we want individual authors to share their thoughts without forcing them into a narrow agenda. That’s the point of streets.mn!
But after years of growing the conversation around a thousand different topics, it’s clear to the Board of Directors that streets.mn would benefit from a mission that better expresses our shared values.
That’s why we’re re-writing our mission, and we need your help.
Candy Chang’s “before I die” board in New Orleans, Louisiana.
The main part of our engagement process is a public, collective brainstorm to help guide the Board as we work on our new Mission and Values statement for the organization.
To do this, we’re stealing a page out of the Candy Chang placemaking playbook. You might know her as a public artist behind the “Before I Die…” chalkboards that first popped up in New Orleans.
We want all our readers to brainstorm together what you want to see in a future Minnesota.
Click here now to share your vision.
Please take a hot second and share a vision for the future. What kind of home do you want? What kind of place do you want to live? What kind of streets do you want to enjoy in the future?
Feel free to let your imagination run free. Fill it out as many times as you like. Your answers will direct the streets.mn Board as we write a mission and values that reflect our community’s vision for the future of Minnesota.
Share a thought about a great place.
Thanks!
Bill Lindeke, streets.mn Board Chair
*Holy moly, it can’t possibly have been that long?
Thanks for taking this on. Looking forward to see the result.
Exciting!
If this place takes up a mission, then where will we be able to have a conversation? If the majority of the userbase agrees on a mission, are others welcome to disgree with that mission or are they welcome to leave?
I like this place as it is. America is polarized enough, is it not?
That’s great feedback. Thanks for sharing. I an optimistic that you’ll be OK with what happens.
I still think it’s hilarious that there’s been comments to the effect that Carol Becker’s articles shouldn’t have been published because they conflict with the mission statement (and it’s kind of a relief for me to have someone else take a turn at being the designated controversy magnet). Considering how inclusive the current mission statement is now it’s pretty obvious those commentators haven’t actually read it and are getting their own idea what it is from the predominant tone of the site.
We appreciate your thoughts on this.
I think that providing a neutral forum where ideas can be discussed is mission enough for Streets.MN — it is one thing to refine the focus of the site, it is another for the site to adopt “correct” positions and accept comment in line with these positions.
In what was is the current mission defective?
Thanks for the feedback! Stay tuned for more on this.