A great place: Belle Isle in Detroit
As a new staff member of the Michigan Municipal League, I’m excited to bring a young, fresh, community-based perspective to the organization and our work. Although I’m new to the blogging world, and usually a pretty quiet person on social media, I am excited to start a weekly blog with the hopes to:
- Promote great place projects happening across Michigan
- Inspire placemaking, creativity and community
- Share placemaking and engagement case studies, articles, reports, best practices and tools
- Help local governments, nonprofits and community leaders connect to MML initiatives and policy frameworks
- Encourage and offer a space for discussion, sharing and communication
Some background info
I live in Detroit and I graduated this past December from Wayne State University with my master’s in public administration. I’ve spent most of my professional career working in community organizing and development throughout the city.
A great place: Detroit SOUP’s monthly citywide dinner
Most recently I worked with Detroit SOUP and helped communities across Detroit, Highland Park and Hamtramck start and (hopefully!) sustain neighborhood-based community fundraising dinners.
I also spent time community organizing alongside youth and parents in low income communities. Community organizing is really just grassroots lobbying– We did research, built relationships, shared stories and advocated for initiatives to reduce youth violence and improve education. Through my experiences, change is smoother, easier to implement, and more positive if it’s resident-driven. Placemaking is no exception.
The blog
Part of my job at MML is to read, digest, and catalog interesting/useful/cool placemaking articles and reports. I’m organizing the information into a database and our hope is to make these articles relevant and available to you as you think about and start placemaking projects.
A great place project: Betsie Valley Trail in Frankfort, MI
Feel free to forward me great articles I can put into our database. I’ll share some articles on Twitter, @MISarahC, but I’ll also feature some of the really good ones here.
As I continue to spend time at the League, I will learn more and more about the wonderful projects and initiatives happening across the state.
But, I need your help!! Tell me about the projects you’re a part of or know about. I would love to feature your story on this weekly blog.
There are a ton of ways to get a hold of me, so please take the initiative to reach out and join the conversation: Email me at [email protected], tweet @MISarahC, write a comment here, call 734-669-6328, you can even send a letter or stop by our office in Ann Arbor.
Looking forward to your involvement!
Sarah Craft is an Information & Policy Research Program Coordinator at the Michigan Municipal League. She can be reached at 734-669-6328 or [email protected].