The Bottom-Up Revolution

Montana Gau is the founder of Strong Denver, a Local Conversation in Colorado. A software engineer by trade, he built the group into a registered nonprofit with a board of directors and several hundred members. Now, city officials are reaching out to the group for collaboration on a variety of initiatives.

In this episode of the The Bottom-Up Revolution, Gau joins Tiffany to discuss Strong Denver’s origins and where the group is now. He talks about how his role shifted as the group grew, from advocating “on the ground” to creating a space where others can more effectively advocate, and the new challenges and opportunities he has because of it.

ADDITIONAL SHOW NOTES

• Local Recommendations:

  • Rino Neighborhood

  • South Broadway

  • Washington Park

  • Irish Rover Pub 

• Strong Denver (Twitter/X)

• Tiffany Owens Reed (Instagram)

• Do you know someone who would make for a great The Bottom-Up Revolution guest? Let us know here!

Travis Goedken is the city manager of Decorah, Iowa. In this Bottom-Up Short, he joins Norm to talk about a few of the practices and reforms that are making Decorah strong, including making its budgeting easier to understand for residents, embracing a highly collaborative planning process, and opening up new housing options by finding creative loopholes in restrictive state laws.

ADDITIONAL SHOW NOTES

• Feeling inspired? Vote for Decorah in the Strongest Town Contest!

• Travis Goedken (LinkedIn)

• Norm Van Eeden Petersman (LinkedIn)

• Do you know someone who would make for a great The Bottom-Up Revolution guest? Let us know here!

Ryan Andrews is the CFO of Hiatus Homes, a small-scale development company in Bend, Oregon. He is also the CFO of the Hiatus Capital Fund, which helps Bend locals invest in development projects in their own community. He’s managed more than 20 investment funds and syndications across real estate debt, equity and venture capital, and he specializes in capitalizing construction and development projects.

In this episode of The Bottom-Up Revolution, Andrews discusses the importance of local investment and explains how to fund small-scale development in a way that channels profits back to locals, instead of outside investors. He and Tiffany discuss the success this model is having in Bend and how it could be replicated in other cities.

ADDITIONAL SHOW NOTES

• Feeling inspired? Vote for Bend in the Strongest Town Contest!

• Local Recommendations:

  • Crosscut Pub

  • Mount Bachelor Community Inc.

• Hear more about Hiatus Homes:

  • “The Bottom-Up Revolution Is...Making a Big Impact With Tiny Homes” (podcast)

  • Hiatus Homes (website)

• Tiffany Owens Reed (Instagram)

• Do you know someone who would make for a great The Bottom-Up Revolution guest? Let us know here!

David Jenkins is a city councilor in La Plata, Maryland, as well as the city’s Local Conversation leader. He joins Norm on this episode of Bottom-Up Shorts to discuss his work with the city’s budget, particularly his efforts to share the city’s financial information with the community in a way that’s easy to understand and actually allows residents to participate in the budgeting process.

ADDITIONAL SHOW NOTES

• La Plata Financial Sustainability podcast

• The Local-Motive session that inspired Jenkins: “Parsing Through Your Local Budget to Find Some Real Answers”

• “You’ll Pay for This! How We Can Afford a Great City for Everyone, Forever” by Michel Durand-Wood

• Learn more about:

  • Finance in a Strong Town

  • Local Conversations

• Norm Van Eeden Petersman (LinkedIn)

• Do you know someone who would make for a great The Bottom-Up Revolution guest? Let us know here!

Dr. Jonathan Gingrich is a professor of engineering at Dordt College in Iowa. A trained chemical and environmental engineer, he started teaching transportation engineering due to staffing shortages. Unsatisfied with the standard materials required for the class, he incorporated the book "Confessions of a Recovering Engineer" by Chuck Marohn into his curriculum and had his class conduct a Crash Analysis Studio.

In this episode of The Bottom-Up Revolution, Dr. Gingrich shares how his unusual background helped him see past engineering codes and look for a better way to design streets. He explains the logistics of incorporating crash analysis and safe street design into the classroom, as well as the benefits it had for his students.

ADDITIONAL SHOW NOTES

• Local Recommendations:

  • Dordt College

  • The Fruited Plain

  • Casey’s Bakery

• Learn more:

  • Crash Analysis Studio

  • "Confessions of a Recovering Engineer" by Chuck Marohn

  • “How One Professor is Inspiring the Next Generation of Transportation Engineers”

• Tiffany Owens Reed (Instagram)

• Do you know someone who would make for a great The Bottom-Up Revolution guest? Let us know here!

Josh Stewart is an advocate from Littleton, Colorado. A year ago, his 12-year-old son was struck and killed by a car while biking to school. Since then, Josh has been relentlessly pushing for safer streets in his community. He joins Norm in this Bottom-Up Short to share his story and what he’s learned over the last year of advocacy work.

ADDITIONAL SHOW NOTES

• “The Cost of an Extra Foot” (article)

• “Large Trucks Need Better Street Design” (article)

• Learn more about the Crash Analysis Studio model for responding to and preventing car crashes.

• Norm Van Eeden Petersman (LinkedIn)

• Do you know someone who would make for a great The Bottom-Up Revolution guest? Let us know here!

• Subscribe to The Bottom-Up Revolution on iTunes, Google Podcasts, Podbean or via RSS.

Jesse Russell is the founder and CEO of Hiatus Homes, a development company in Bend, Oregon, that specializes in small home design and cottage community development. In 2019, he introduced Bend’s first small-scale housing community. He’s also been involved in citywide policy and incentive reform for small-scale development and urban infill.

Russell joins Tiffany on today’s episode of The Bottom-Up Revolution to discuss his journey from Los Angeles TV producer to small-scale developer. They talk about how to navigate the challenges of building small homes, including city policies and project financing, and how this kind of development can benefit communities.

ADDITIONAL SHOW NOTES

• Local Recommendations:

  • Deschutes Bar

  • Boneyard Brewery

  • Hayden Homes Amphitheatre

  • Whitewater Park Surf Wave

• Hiatus Homes (website)

• Learn how to bring more housing to your city:

  • “The Housing-Ready City: A Toolkit for Local Code Reform”

  • Accelerator program, spring session: Get expert guidance in making your community housing ready.

• Tiffany Owens Reed (Instagram)

• Do you know someone who would make for a great The Bottom-Up Revolution guest? Let us know here!

• Subscribe to The Bottom-Up Revolution on iTunes, Google Podcasts, Podbean or via RSS.

In this Bottom-Up Short, Norm is joined by Christian Schick, the leader of Strong Towns RVA, a Local Conversation in Richmond, Virginia. The group has built a lot of momentum in the past year, and Schick talks about how they did that in a productive and helpful way, particularly while juggling local elections.

ADDITIONAL SHOW NOTES

• Strong Towns RVA (Linktree).

• Norm Van Eeden Petersman (LinkedIn).

• Do you know someone who would make for a great The Bottom-Up Revolution guest? Let us know here!

Mike Christensen is the executive director of the Utah Rail Passenger Association, where he works to educate the public and policy makers about the value of investing in passenger rail. He also serves on Salt Lake City’s planning commission, as well as the boards of the Utah chapter of the Congress for the New Urbanism, the Utah Transit Riders Union and the national Rail Passengers Association.

Christensen joins Tiffany Owens Reed on this episode of The Bottom-Up Revolution to discuss the benefits of passenger rail, including how it can lead to more productive land use, as well as his work advocating for better public transit outside of metropolitan areas.

ADDITIONAL SHOW NOTES

• Local Recommendations:

  • Temple Square

  • Red Iguana

  • Park Cafe

• Mike Christensen (Twitter/X)

• Utah Rail Passenger Association (website)

• Amtrak Long Distance Study

• Tiffany Owens Reed (Instagram)

• Do you know someone who would make for a great The Bottom-Up Revolution guest? Let us know here!

Varsha Gopal is an architect from Chennai, India. She is putting Strong Towns ideas into action by starting conversations about what makes places thrive — what makes them special, sustainable and prosperous. On this episode of Bottom-Up Shorts, she joins Norm to discuss two research projects she recently conducted in her city and what they taught her about thriving cities, urban design and community engagement.

ADDITIONAL SHOW NOTES

• Norm Van Eeden Petersman (LinkedIn).

• Do you know someone who would make for a great The Bottom-Up Revolution guest? Let us know here!

• Subscribe to The Bottom-Up Revolution on iTunes, Google Podcasts, Podbean or via RSS.