I talked, as I often do, about online civic activists, social media surgeries and the nurturing of neighbourhood level civic activity online. The presentation is below but the 5 key points are:
The film that appears on slide 3 is here (yes it does make me look like a git. The viseo was shot the morning after the power had coned our street in the small hours (because of a sports match) then started slapping tickets on cars – we went to bed legally parked and woke up illegaly parked, without warning).
Fascinating lesson from Cindy Gallop on how the internet changes our real world and the “pornification of culture”. (have I just got this site blocked form every local government web service?)
“The single biggest impact technology is having on our most fundamental human activity, our sexuality”
Also includes a big challenge to understand social media around pornography. Hat tip various on twitter.
I’m with Titus Dawo at the Balsall heath Social Media Surgery. All I’m doing here is giving him and idea of how simple it can be to publish to the web.
I’m on the train home from the Big Society network launch in London this afternoon. A strong and varied group of people brought together to consider, be sceptical about and challenge the notion of the Big Society.
I’m on a train to London for the launch of the Big Society Network and pondering. This week Nat Wei described the Network as having a
…mission to be – in partnership with government, business, and the voluntary sector – an action-orientated remover of barriers to mass civic engagement where people live – enabling the change we want to be.
an army of community organisers that will become the “catalyst” for communities to band together and challenge the apparently arbitrary decisions made about public services in their name. “I want them to be the glue bringing community together. They will be financially independent of government. They will be able to have different views from government. There can be healthy debate and this can build social capital. [Organisers] I hope will end up as trusted as the local GP,”
For me though that is one helluva switch. It means that today you lot can start making the most of Social Media Surgery Plus – a site created to make it easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy to find, organise and report on social media surgeries. Read the rest of this entry »
Abdullah from the Forum and Andrew Brightwell. Picture by Nisha Virdi
We’ve been holding some social media surgeries in Balsall Heath. So far they’ve been supported by the Birmingham Social Investment Trust and our hope is that, after our third event on July 7, we’ll be able to carry them on as completely voluntary events. If you’re interested you can sign up here.
These are my links for June 10th through June 19th:
Neighbourhoods Learning Together — BVSC – Course available for community activists in North Birmingham and Sandwell: “30 places are available and we want to the group to reflect the diversity of the area. If there are barriers or support needs which are making you hesitate, then let us know and we’ll see what we can do. The venues for the sessions will be wheel chair accessible.”
Swimming pool data scraping: comparing opening times | Where can we swim? – “Birmingham City Council’s leisure centre website isn’t an easy place to look for information, harder still to try to take data, but that’s just what I’ve spent some considerable time trying to do….” Our own Andrew Brightwell continues his one man campaign to scrutinise availability of swimming pools.
Pentagon hunts WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in bid to gag website | Media | The Guardian – The Daily Beast, a US news reporting and opinion website, reported that Pentagon investigators are trying to track down Julian Assange – an Australian citizen who moves frequently between countries – after the arrest of a US soldier last week who is alleged to have given the whistleblower website a classified video of American troops killing civilians in Baghdad.
Futurebuilders — loan business scrapped, new direction will be grants for neighbourhood organisations « The BSSEC blog – “Civil Society Media website reports that Nick Hurd, the civil society minister, has confirmed that Futurebuilders — New Labour’s flagship loans-plus-support model for investing in third sector development, managed by the Social Investment Business — is “effectively closed for business”. In future the £200m fund will be dedicated to providing grants to stimulate the formation of neighbourhood-based organisations, a clear change of direction under the coalition’s new ‘big society’ policies.
The Office for Civil Society (the replacement for the Office of the Third Sector) has also confirmed that Capacitybuilders and the youth volunteering organisation v — both major New Labour initiatives — are “under review”.”
The site allows citizens to collaborate which each other to ask civic questions and find the answers. HMI was also recognised in Talk About Locals Un Awards earlier this year – (full result on the Guardian site) thank you!
A decade ago I made a half hour documentary about allotments, called Losing the Plot. The programme reflected what was then a confused attitude to urban land and how we value greenspace.
It featured academic and activist Simon Baddeley talking about his campaign to prevent homes being built on the Victoria Jubilee allotments, which border Handsworth Park.
Grab your plot
Simon and his neighbours couldn’t stop the housing development, but they did manage to get planning to require the developers to re-instate 80 of the allotments plots. Simon has fought long and hard to ensure that this commitment is honoured. Yesterday he claimed his plot:
Simon Baddeley: "Got the plot"
and filmed this:
A few weeks ago Simon also digitised the original documentary, which you can see here:
A healthier approach to Urban Land?
For me the re-opening of the allotments represents a small symbol of a shifting attitude to land in our cities. At the time the doucmentary was made it felt like land was there for developers and individual profit. Since then demand for allotments has grown, people are showing off their pride in these places, the Birmingham Open Spaces Forum is nurturing a better relationship between citizens and council. Parks like Cannon Hill and Handsworth have improved immeasurably and the famous CoCoMad in Cotteridge Park has shown how far open space cements community relations.
As Emma Woolf, of the Friends of Cotteridge Park, explained in one one of our first Grassroots Channel Podcasts in 2005, conflict over public space can be a catalyst for a community coming together:
Is it time for a more flexible understand of public land?
Martin Field has been making the case for an easy to use map of publicly owned land plots in the city. He’s made a tiny bit of progress:
We emailed a simple google map reference to the relevant officer and within 24 hours we had a response as to the specific ownership. Very good service and free, although you can only determine if the land is owned by the City or not, but still a good start. If the City does not own the land you are directed to the UK Land Registry, which is not a good experience and not free!
Last week I was at the Handsworth Residents Network meeting, which included a detailed discussion about how hard and frustrating it is for community groups to clean up or use eyesore plots.
The council itself has been seeking to streamline the process of transferring assets into the hands of community groups through it’s Community Asset Transfer Development Programme. (I’ve been involved in recording that programme). Their work includes thinking of broader ways to measure the value of using land, called Valuing Worth. This is supported by a wide range of other activity – including Growspace, which is taking hold in Ladywood.
These are small things.
I think we are still confused about ways of using urban land and why shouldn’t we be. Cities are confusing places. But people outside and inside local authorities are finding it easier to collaborate to make better use of land for community benefit.
What else do we need to do during a time of lower public spending, tighter financial restrictions for developers and an ideological/economic battle over where food should be produced? Update – perhaps all questions you can explore at the Cultures of Birmingham: Open Spaces event from the Chamberlain forum on 24th June at 6.30 at the the Mac in Cannon Hill park
