Resilient Sioux Falls

 

Mission Statement

To establish neighborhood hubs, neighborhood congresses, community organizations, and community development corporations (CDCs) through dynamic citizen engagement.

Project Description

1,500-5000 residents make up a typical neighborhood. By those standards, Sioux Falls should have as many as 130 defined neighborhoods. However, as of 2020, the city has only 11 active neighborhood organizations and only one community development corporation (All Saints). Without an established neighborhood identity, residents are less likely to connect with the place they live and to engage in sustainable behaviors that help create a thriving neighborhood.

Resilient Sioux Falls is an integrated sustainability program focusing on neighborhood identity development by fostering discussion, collaboration, and action through a series of neighborhood community forums and a gamified badge system tied to proven sustainability strategies. It also acts as a bridge between individual citizens looking to catalyze change and city/institutional programs that can help facilitate that change. 

 

Resilient Sioux Falls Process (Per Neighborhood)

Phase 1: Promote the Game to the “Players” (Lead-Up)

  • Duration: 1 to 2 Months

  • Promote event series using USPS Routes as starting point

  • Identify Neighborhood Liaisons/Speakers

  • Door-to-Door Campaign along with partnerships with businesses and community organizations

  • Hang Posters at community spaces

Phase 2: Identify the Neighborhoods (First Meeting)

  • 3 hour Event held in a neighborhood hub

  • Neighbors will answer questions that shed light on the collective identity of a neighborhood

  • Mapping of boundaries, resources, assets, and challenges

Phase 3: Present the Data and Introduce the Badges (Second Meeting)

  • 3 Hour Event held in a neighborhood hub

  • Data collected up to this point in the 

  • Badges are connected to proven strategies and actions that contribute to a neighborhood's thrivability. There are hundreds of badges to consider and the list will continue to grow.

  • Badges range from actions taken by an individual to the entire neighborhood.

Phase 4: Start to Play the Game (Third Meeting)

  • 3 Hour Event held in a neighborhood hub

  • Data collected will be reported back to the neighborhood and the city.

  • Strategies put forth by the neighborhood will be integrated with the existing list. 

  • Neighbors will begin acquiring badges as individuals, households, and neighborhoods

Phase 5: Assess the Challenges and Opportunities (Moving Forward)

  • Neighborhood Speakers will be identified and act as civic connectors, collaborators, and translators.

  • Community Hubs in each neighborhood will be established. These spaces would ideally be places that people already gather.

  • Pathways to neighborhood based projects, programs, and organizations will take shape. 

  • The BAM CityLab: Whittier at the Union Gospel Mission will act as the template for how these spaces function. 

Evaluation of Success

  • A pre and post wellness survey comparing data

  • Stakeholder survey

  • Number of neighbor congresses, associations, cdc’s and associated businesses and non-profits established

  • Event Participation

Statement of Impact

Resilient Sioux Falls will facilitate community wellness through the establishment of as many as 132 neighborhood congresses feeding into as many as 17 neighborhood wards that will provide direct and dynamic civic engagement between council members and their constituents. In partnership with the BAM Institute, Resilient Sioux Falls will aid in the identification of and investment in community spaces that bridge citizens with municipal resources, maximizing the effectiveness of community-based projects.

Anticipated Outcomes

  • Increased sense of identity for individual neighborhoods

  • Detailed qualitative and quantitative wellness data

  • Identification of unique values and priorities of each neighborhood

  • Open-source data made available to private and public entities for more customized initiatives and business opportunities

  • Stakeholders can make more data-driven decisions

  • Sustainable community improvement facilitated by newly created neighborhood associations and CDC’s

  • Stronger Civic Engagement

  • Beautification of neighborhoods

  • Increased entrepreneurial activities

  • Projects designed and deployed by community members

  • Increased civic pride

  • Increased quality of life 

  • Detailed identification of unique assets, challenges, and opportunities present  in neighborhoods

  • Scalable initiatives are more easily identified, designed, and deployed

What are they going to get?

  • A Physical “Newspaper” with a Neighborhood Wellness Assessment, a Neighborhood Mapping Activity, and Resilient Sioux Falls Graphic Poster

  • 3 Facilitated Events per neighborhood

  • Sustainability Badge System and Benchmarking Process

  • Neighborhood Identity Marketing Campaign

  • Qualitative and Quantitative GIS Data

  • Platform and Framework for Continued Neighborhood Catalyzing

Resources Available

  • Citylab Office Space

  • Existing Neighborhood Associations

  • Network of Sioux Falls Community Groups

Resources Needed

  • $30,000 to prototype the first 3 neighborhoods

  • City approval

  • 2 additional staff

Contact jordan@civicbiodesign.org for more information.