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“Urban Lunch” Events Goal: Increase Creative Class Civic Engagement

By Sharon Fisher, 2-17-10

Events such as the three incarnations of Ignite Boise proved that Idaho’s creative class could put on a show. Now they’re trying to change the world—or, at least, part of it.

A subset of the same Twitterati that attend, perform, and promote Ignite Boise now hold a monthly lunch event on what can best be described as “civic issues.” Thus far they’ve included the Boise Streetcar, the Boise comprehensive plan, and urban renewal legislation.  The presentations are on a layman’s level and the discussions, held in Boise’s business incubator the Watercooler, are casual and far-ranging.

The result could be a recapturing of the sense of civic engagement that some say that Boise, like many other cities, has lost.

Along with The Rise of the Creative Class, by Richard Florida, one of the books I like to quote a lot is Bowling Alone, by Richard Putnam, which examines the loss of social engagement in American communities in the twentieth century. While there’s many theoretical causes, the point is that fewer and fewer Americans get involved in their communities—causing what speaker Phil Kushlan, executive director of the Capital City Development Corporation (Boise’s urban renewal district), describes as the “STP Syndrome”: the Same Ten People do everything.

There’s actually a number of organizations in the Treasure Valley that try to capture people’s sense of civic engagement. The City Club has lectures every month or so on a wide variety of topics, including its annual Pundits Forum on the Idaho Legislature. The Urban Land Institute, for real estate and development professionals, has meetings every quarter or so on development topics. The Idaho chapter of the US Green Building Council, primarily made up of architects, building engineers, and designers, has monthly meetings and socials covering building design and sustainability topics. COMPASS brings in people occasionally to talk on a professional level about urban planning and transportation topics.  The Boise Young Professionals, sort of a junior auxiliary of the Boise Metro Chamber, has meetings and socials aimed towards business people. TechBoise and Kickstand have similar meetings for computer geeks and entrepreneurs.

It’s enough to keep any meeting junkie hopping.

The difference between these organizations and Urban Lunch is that, though a healthy smattering of Boise’s planning community attends, Urban Lunch gatherings aren’t aimed at a particular profession, but simply at people who happen to live in the Treasure Valley and who are interested in the future of the area. The group is non-partisan and doesn’t come from any particular shade of the political spectrum. In short, the attraction is not what you *do*, but what you *are*.

Tentative upcoming topics include a partnership between Boise State University and the Brookings Institute and its Metropolitan Planning Program; urban gardening; bike commuting; historic preservation; neighborhood associations; and a futuristic “Vision for Boise,” according to Chris Blanchard, a doctoral student in urban planning at Portland State and one of the Boise Twitterati also involved in Ignite Boise (and whose work occasionally graces New West).

Today’s talk (did you wonder whether I was ever getting back to that?) focused on the half dozen or more pieces of legislation relating to urban renewal introduced during this legislative session. One of them, H567, was produced by the CCDC in an attempt to head off other efforts, such as H489, which calls for a vote for any improvement district project over $250,000. Currently, urban renewal districts—the legislation of which hasn’t been changed in 40 years—offer one of the few flexible tools cities have, Kushlan said, noting how difficult it was to get 66 2/3% of Idahoans to agree on anything.

A subcommittee of the House Revenue and Tax Committee has been set up to discuss the various bills, Kushlan said. As with last year’s multiple transportation bills, is likely to generate a couple of bills using different parts of all the other submitted bills.

Urban Lunch meetings are held the third Wednesday of each month at noon at 1401 West Idaho St. The lectures themselves are free; lunch is available by reservation for $10.

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