A Story Can Change A City

Alright, hello everyone. Welcome to On the Park Bench, a public square. Conversation brought to you by the Congress for the new urbanism. On the park bench presents interactive conversations with thought leaders in New Orleans and allied industries. Providing an opportunity for the audience to engage in real time. The webinar series is a platform for senior members to engage, debate, and collaborate on pressing issues of the day. Today's webinar is a story. Can change a city with John Pageant and Chris Elisara. And you can share your thoughts on hashtag on the Park Bench at WWW. Tiny URL. Dot com slash OTPB feedback. And you can also join us for upcoming webinars. Join us on Tuesday, November 20 eighth. For Authors Forum, Climate Resilience for an Aging Nation. Danielle Aragoni will discuss her new book on how communities with aging populations can prepare for climate change. On Tuesday, December, the nineteenth, you can join us for planning for physical activity. Amy Groves of Dover Coal, Wade Walker of Kiddles and Associates, and John Simmerman of Active Towns Initiative discussed planning for physical activity through parks, safety, streets, and livable transportation as exemplified by a highly touted recent plan for Lake Wales. Florida. Robert Stuartville will moderate. You can register online for both of these webinars at CNU. Org slash resources slash on the park bench. And be sure to save the date. For our 30 s annual congress seeing you 32 will be in Cincinnati Ohio. On May fifteenth through 7 eighteenth 2024. This is the premier national event bringing together policy. Makers, planners, urban designers, developers, planners, urban designers, developers, advocates, planners, urban designers, developers, advocates, students, and more to engage with the trends and challenges, developers, advocates, students, and more to engage with the trends and challenges related to engage with the trends and challenges related to building community. You can learn [email protected] slash CNU. 32. And we also have lots of opportunities for you to participate in the lead up to CNU. 32. If you are seeing you member, be sure to propose your charter amendments by December third. Charter amendments will elevate those aspects of our shared practice that members can consider fundamental to new urbanism. Also, please remember to submit session proposals for CNU. 32. We are soliciting proposals for classes and meetings with an emphasis on sessions that explore the Congress focus of restorative urbanism. Those are due December, the fifth. And finally, the 2,024 charter awards are open for submissions to the end of the year. Winning projects represent major contributions to building more equitable, sustainable, connected, healthy, and prosperous communities. Submissions are due December, the 30 first. And now for today's webinar. John Paget is a documentary filmmaker focused on stories about cities, towns, and neighborhoods. John is driven by the agony of America's homogenization and the thrill of seeing communities survive and thrive. When they rediscover and celebrate their unique character identity and story. With Chris Elisara. He founded First in main films with the belief that storytelling can help build communities and preserve and revitalize the places we all love. Chris Elisara is a free range advocate for cities and places in 2,009 he teamed up with John to create an award winning film on urban design for the Congress for the new urbanism. He also served as board member for CNU and co-founded the Better Cities Film Festival, which collects, curates, and presents the very best films on the theme. Of making better cities, towns, and neighborhoods. And I'm Lauren Mayor, communications manager at CNU. As a reminder, please use the Q&A function to ask questions as they occur to you. Welcome everyone and let's start today's webinar over to you, John. Okay, thank you very much. Great to be here. Alone with Chris. Chris. Good to see you. And. We need to see the presentation, John, though. Yep, I'm gonna start that now. Perfect. Alright. Everybody see that? So just to kick things off, we're gonna share our story. As a film studio. First to main films. Is it is a creative studio focused on storytelling for cities, And what a phone studio will do is often. Create a demo reel of all their best shots and we wanted to do that but we also wanted to do it in a way that shares our story and shares our belief that what, that a story can change the city. I will share that now. Every city. Every town has a story to tell. Hiding right there in plain sight. Maybe it is touching. Historic or unshakeably optimistic. Perhaps it is gritty. And self determined. We find those stories and we tell them for you. And film. Whether it's for celebration. Revitalization or promotion. John Pantet began his career creating award-winning films on America's Main Street, films that helped revive a strain of small towns that had been nearly forgotten. He founded first in main films with his friend Chris Elisara, an advocate for places people love and the people in communities that build them and Call them home. So what is first in name? It's a street corner and nearly every American city. And it's a film company. We're proudly headquartered in the Runs. But we really live at the intersection of storytelling and placemaking. At the crossroads of ideas about cities and towns. Ideas about how to make them better. Ideas about how to share their stories. We've done this all over the world. Right here in our hometown of Buffalo. If there's one thing we've learned. If there's one thing we know. It's this. Story can change the city. It can change everything. You And Hey, it's great to be here. Hope enjoyed that film. The shot that I love probably the most in that is the one where the dad and the kid are on the skateboard going down the street. He just comes in that corner there, the kid is smiling and. John's got the camera right there. I love that. And, we make a pretty audacious claim in that. Yeah, video and in this particular presentation that, you know, a story can change a city. So we're just gonna spend a few little bit few minutes of time here just talking about. Why we believe that. And I'll first argument is a culture argument. So we know that cities are made. Through human culture. Our minds, our hands. And the stories that we share. The package of culture and through the Better City Fell Festival and First in Maine. We bring the essential element of stories. To see in you and to the new urban movement. Film the flickering light of a screen the new community storytelling fire circle. We're communal stories. Wisdom and meaning are exchanged. And we bring the bonfire. The new bonfire to see in you. And to new Seeing you is most effective. As an agent of change when it blends the mechanics. That is everything on the left hand side of the slide. The how and why of criminal design. The planning, the architecture, design, development, construction. With the humanics. Meaning ethics, values. Beauty, justice, the good life. And stories. And the mechanics of CNU are exceptional. They're innovative, they are piercing. And strategically focused on advancing its mission. And we're working through the Better City Film Festival. And first in Maine. The help bring the same level of excellence. Innovation and strategic focus to the new urbanism storytelling. So when we blend? See and use mechanics. With storytelling. We have an impact that's greater than the parts. That's all first thesis. John's gonna lead us into the next thesis. Well, Douglas Copeland, Coin this term deneration. To explain the plight of generation X originally and he defined denariation as the process whereby one light. Stop feeling like a story. And through our travels and storytelling what I think what we discovered and I think what a lot of the people are observing. Is that this? Idea of, generation is now something that applies to our communities. To cities and towns. There are many forces of generation at work. It's the loss of Historic buildings and fabric that tie us to our story is the last of storytelling storytelling happening through local newspapers. It's a lot of generational continuity as families are unable to agent place. So a lot of a lot of courses combined. To where communities and places are losing. That story. That narrative of their place. So the second point in our argument is. Why story is a vital part of your ribbonism? Is we don't have the stories. Or enough of the stories that can fire the imagination to rebuild our cities and towns. As walkable, mixed use, green, connected. Places. C, CENTRE, Urban Development Stories. And the impact of that development and land use pattern to colonize our imaginations. So. That's what we build. If we had a stop sprawl. Henry, like, and, down towns and small towns. We believe we need to re storify. And that is a need to be a part of our toolkit. Restoreifying. In our communities as a part of the new urban cult that we must stem. The tide of deneration. And as you know. This is important book. You want to talk about this for a bit, Don? Sure, this is amazing book, written by James and Deborah Pellows. And they flew a small plane. All across America for several years. Living living and revisiting so over a hundred different small towns. To look at. What towns were successfully revitalizing how they were doing it and what And. So this is this is their book where they kind of present that story and the result of that. And. It was very interesting at the in the final chapter they identified kind of 11. Hallmarks of a town that is successfully revitalizing. And one of those. Hallmarks was The community knew it's civic story. A town that was successfully revitalizing knew their story. They knew where they become from. They knew what challenges. They had faced in the past and overcome. They have a common vision for the future, where they were going. So it was very interesting to Sorry, independent confirmation. The story and civic story is so important. For communities. And you know, we think a lot about place in the new earnest movement or place makers were concerned with place making. And here is how David Fleming and Lean Logic defined. Please. The space like space to just local narrative can still be heard. It could be heard again. Given the chance. Is being major habitat. Of our species. We believe that and as we are going through a process to amend the charter. The first paragraph of the charter says, and list some of the things that contributing. To the community building challenge that we currently face and the charter is responding to it. It lists a bunch of those things. Inc the separation of race and income, environment deterioration. Loss of agricultural lands. And our argument is that . Lots of story, deneration, also He is one of the interrelated community building challenge issues. And so we're proposing. An amendment to the senior charter to include the loss of narrative. Or the generation of places as a part of this one. Interrelated community challenge. Where that's going to pass muster with the committee on the odd if we, yeah, we don't know. But. Where are you gonna, we believe it and we're gonna, you know, throw that out there. And we know that's gonna be debated, but you know, whether that passes or not. If you're having trouble thinking about the relevance of storytelling in your Think about the current state of the 15 min city. It became prominent, celebrated, had momentum. And then it slammed into a story that put the brakes on it. And now it faces head ones. None of the mechanics changed. Just the story about the 15 min city change. If new urbanism is going to flourish, it needs both the technical expertise and the evidence. Of new, but also equally compelling and true stirring telling. That wins the hearts and minds. Of New So the power of story. We believe as we've told you, has the Change the city. And we love this quote by Margaret Wheatley. And we have discovered and perfected the art of narrating stories that bolster and contribute to the development of new urbanism through the civic story. The principles of the Civic Story. Is a tool that can you they can use for engagement. Community support and coverage for change. And the understanding of how to change. And John's going to now walk us through. Some of the techniques. That we use to tell a story that you need. Probably know if you're gonna start telling stories in your practice. We're gonna give away all of our, technique and secrets here. So. One of the things we Recently, on, telling civic stories because we. Realize that's a way to build a community. Help them see their story and then they're and they're poised to have a vision for change or revitalization. And, some of the ways we found that make us civic stories, especially effective. First in kind of structuring the story. Our one of our insights is to You know, make a city, the character, make the community the character. So in typical films, in the movies that you watch, Yeah, the main character is a hero. When it comes to the search story, what we want to think of is the town is the hero. The town is the hero. So you in the first. Scenes of the film you introduced the town. You talk about how it's a special place, but you need place. Then in the next stage of the story, you make us care about that pound and you make it relatable. And the way you do that is. You introduce contradiction. And idiosyncrasies to the town. Why this is important is that otherwise you're gonna be kind of on it because it comes at typical Promo piece, if all you're doing is saying, This town is great. Well then that's like a Tourism, Bill, Chamber of Commerceville. It was just typing. So you wanna make it real. And you want to introduce some of us, to the place that make it really unique. And relatable. Then. 3, in the next case, you introduce the problem. This is the conflict in the story. What challenge is the community facing? For example, it could be, you know, a lot of communities today are facing the challenge of housing. And then once you introduce the problem, then you have to rank the state. And recent mistakes means. You know, I great question. You can get this is what if we do nothing? What's going to happen if we continue on this trajectory? What the worst is scenario. You really talk about what the worst it could happen. So we. Good. A greater idea of the thread. How was by the problem. And then finally you show the action. Which is hopefully a community embracing. And it may not be. A total resolution you might be only showing the green shoots the person sparked, change some people turning to Revitalize or solve their problem. That's certainly a more inspiring film. There's also the film where There's a tragedy. Where the action is that the community isn't doing anything. And that's more of the, that side of the story. So that's kind of how to structure the story. And then a couple of other hacks and hints that we have. It is casting, so choosing your characters. We like to. Do these films you're using in the voices of the people themselves so that the specific 3 is really the story. Community in their own words. So we like to choose the diverse range of characters. By diverse, we mean, you know, not just gender and ethically diverse, but walks of life. So sometimes the armchair historian the bartender who just loves his hometown can be a more charismatic speaker. Than the official, the official historian of the library. So you want them experts, you might want to have an urban planner. A official, but you have also want. Some other folks in the community to try to. Create a chorus of voices. They really represent the community. And then 2 is to really let them say it in their own words. So your story coming will come in the editing of it in that kind of direction as you combine all their voices. But for now, let them tell the story their own words. So do it through an interview and not a script. Don't prescript it and let them speak direct to camera. Good find that looking directly camera is is an effective. Method 3, make it 3 acts. That's just simply referring back to the previous slide. Tell us, think of it in terms of 3 X. Think of it in terms of the setup, they increase the conflict and the problem. And then the solution of the revolution. Tell the whole story Which means, you know, don't sugar code it. By Premier in public. This is a really important point. Don't, we, you know. To really leverage these films to their full impact. It's important to gather the community. So they can see and experience their story together. And so it's important to. Once you roll it out, it can eventually go to YouTube and the social platforms. Where it can go viral, but it's important to have a public screen. Where people experience the story together and interact over it. Chris, do you wanna add any? Fine tuning points to those. No, not at all. No, I just wanna get to Al's story. So we can move into. Okay. Probably people waiting when you and I get to our story. We're gonna start telling our story now it won't use this. Technique because that's a different technique, storytelling, but we're just gonna tell our story. About the film festival. And the first thing I'll really want to emphasize is that Seeing you. Was the place that this festival was born from. Seniors DNA is in this festival. So in the constellation you're probably familiar with the slide. That is in the seeing your website says. In the constellation of landmark books. Ideas and initiatives. That have been born from CNU. We were one of them. Because we have to go into our story, you'll see we started. In C in New Denver in 2,009 and 19. So whether you're like it or not or you think is so not we're a part of this, seeing you offspring. John, why don't you tell us how it all started? We have been following senior for years. You know, when I look at that photo of the founders, seeing you for years. You know, when I look at that photo of the founders, see you in Alexandria in 1993 at that time. I I was a filmmaker on Route 66, which our opening film, going through these mainstream towns and looking at What is what was happening to towns across America? And, you know, in going through that experience and trying to understand what was happening to the American built environment, I started reading a lot of the seminal books. On you. We can't aware of the Congress for Always showed it to Chris. We would talk about it. We would look at where they're going each year and think about going. But we always wonder, well, we're filmmakers, how do we fit into this world of architects, players, and designers. You look at the conference schedule, look at the topics that they're going over and we just built. You know, where do we fit into this? We're filmmakers, we're huge fans of this and we haven't expanded it and we know what's important and we want to tell stories about it. So then one year it was seeing you, and, and, and, and early enough. She, they're gonna have a film contest and the winner of the phone contest would get a free path. Good to Congress and that's when we knew. This is our upgrade. So we can enter the film. We create this phone built the last 2 min film and we won the competition. And, yeah, it was great. Chris, what was, what was your memory of that? Remember that as you got standing ovation. So went from outsiders complete outside as no one knew us from the doorpost to insiders. In 2 min with that standing ovation and that's basically said we belong to this community and we had something to offer the community and so that got us rolling and really encouraged. We. To do what we're doing today. And then, you know, the conversation that we were having, as John was mentioning. John's brother. Living in LA at the time was a part of the conversation. He was seeing the films that we were showing and developing. And that inspired him and his buddy. Joel Kara Haitiian to do to develop a book club called Noodles and New Urbanism. So they would Eat lunch at a noodle stop and then read a new evidence book and have a conversation. And that is how the festival got born. At that noodles and urbanism book club. The idea led to them saying, hey, let's do a film festival. All this thing kind of came together because Josh was managing the Acme Theatre in Hollywood at the time. So he said, let's, let's do it. Yeah, I mean, I think that's exactly right. But I think the book club was noodles and new urbanism sounds fun but I think one of their frustrations was that they couldn't get all their friends to read these books. Yeah, right. You know, and it's still they thought okay next plan B was let's do a film festival. Maybe they'll come and watch. Chris, I were making fun. You know, engaging films about their, like our American makeover series. And so they thought, what if there's other films out there like this? Is there enough that we could create a film festival and that would bring you know a popular audience to these ideas and concepts. Yeah, so from the very beginning. Joel and Josh, they were releasing the film festival to galvanize Action catalyze Midtown Los Angeles grassroots urban activism bike infrastructure, transportation, housing, getting elected officials that I understand you onto the council. So it's always had a purpose. And so this is an example of one of the Tours on those first new urban at that time called in new urban as a film festival in probably 2,000 and. 14 or 2,015. So there's the bike right on the left looking at the streets and there's the proposed treatments on on the right so it's always had this DNA a part of it as well. And. It was in a theater, but it was also in the theater and and on the street so out on the street they had a park lid walks talks inside the theater outside the theater I go on a pastry walk. And look at the urban character of of the neighborhood and how it could change and so on and so forth they'd do a 24 h filmmaking challenge. Happy Hours at the adjacent restaurant and so on and so forth. And then they invited prominent folks that you probably remember here and there. You know, 10 years, 15 years ago. There is. Stefanos. Recall. There's recall. And I was also supported by the CNU board of California at that time. So. Howard Blacks in the old Peyton and so on and so forth supported the festival. There's a photo of coming up I think of Howard and some of the others. And. But something was happening that was never intended. To happen. Do you wanna talk about that, John? Sure, so, you know, Josh lost us in a comedy theater that, even was running right in Hollywood. And, but the people that were coming to this eventually, sort of saying, wow, you know, I'd love to be able to screen these films in my account. So They started asking John, could you put a real together of the best? Films and I could take it to my community and show it. So kind of by popular demand. We packed this festival and figure it out the way take the show on the road. So they began doing screenings in other communities what we call satellite screens or local screenings. We help other communities bring better cities film festival to their town. So that these stories could really scale. And go to new audiences. And go beyond Hollywood. So that was, not originally intended, but it's really become. The heart of the film festival. This is where we really reach. You know, audiences of scale. Through partnering with local organizations. To bring in better city film festival for one night. To show films and this is an example of a variety of different. Recent hosts and you can see that also they're really leveraging it. They're putting they're doing events. With panels. With programmings, with, creating a place making festival around the film festival. So there's a lot of other elements that go into it. . That. Extend, extend beyond just showing the. And, here's just a few of. The review that we've been getting. Chris, feel free to read a few of these if you want. Because they develop up here. Catherine's from Penalima because we have Dave Alden coming and talking about Petal a little bit, but Catherine says, you know, I feel deeply grateful for those wonderful films. Elmir spoke after the screening and said it was she was a mate. He was amazed. He was jazzed, not amazed. He was jazz and inspired. So, you know, you can read the. The rest of those reviews, but this this is what we're trying to do with these satellite festivals to have this type of effect. And it's and it seems to be working. I think, one of the important elements of the better cities film festivals, there is a lot of media out now and a lot of videos. About, new, ideas and concepts that you can find on YouTube. There's just so much content out there. But we're just at the drift in it. What the key thing that better city film does is it gathers. It has the power to get our community into a room together. 2 experience these ideas and this inspiration all at the same time the same moment. In the same place. Where they can interact afterwards and kick it around. And that's really unique. It's a really unique benefit of the of the So, but continuing our story. Josh, my brother. Who founded this innovative, new, film festival. In 2,018 went through Right, a life change in one year he both got married. And he enrolled in seminary to become an Episcopal priest. So as part of that, he moved across the country out of Beverly Hills to Alexandria. To enroll in seminary and you know as part of that he had to put the film festival on a And at that time, it was unclear. The future of New Orleans, but Film Festival. And wasn't, wasn't sure what was going to happen. But before we. Before died, Chris and I talked more with Josh and said, not so fast. And we offer to. Acquire it and work which retained Josh in his key role, the festival director. But to take it on. And invest in it and build it. As part of that, there was a decision to rename it. And rebrand it. And to change the venue since we had lot. The inner venue in Hollywood with Josh's move. Where to hold the festival was an open-ended question too. So. That was it. That was a key juncture. And we relaunched. With our new name, a new brand. In Louisville. That's seen you 27. And how it makes another appearance? That's party. Yeah. Chris. There's Howard? From our biggest pack, S. Yeah. And, we decided to move to Detroit. As part of that branding decision. We wanted to locate in a city that was. Kind of the poster child or And that was one of the reasons we looked at doing it in Detroit. We had the senior chapter, Michigan chapter. Has been a great ally. And, invited us. To bring the festival there. So that was a part of the evolution, but it should be possible to hold our flagship event. In Detroit. And this is a few photos from our festival. This year in Detroit. We were at Campus Marches, which was. Chris, you want to talk about that? Well, yeah, I mean, this was our tenth anniversary. So it was really a big festival for us to celebrate those those years, the years that you were Just being walking through the story with us about. And We celebrated with a downtown Detroit partnership and this is Campus Marshes on the opening night. And then we moved after the opening night to Wayne State University. And to the theater there and all, we'll show some photographs of that. But this is the opening night. It poured rain. It was completely soaking raining that day. But luckily we had this Bump roof tent. Which kept the patrons and the bar. Totally dry. So we have a great night of film and, and celebration. The red couple was out. The popcorn was there. And, we showed the. 2 films, The Placeman and The engine inside is a film about biking that night and to do it in campus marshes, you know, the heart of downtown and a place that helped turn Detroit around was was was pretty, was pretty, was pretty special. And if you don't know anything about the festival, we just want to show you just. This little film that tells you what the festival is all about. You And And You Oh. Not sure what happened. So that's a promotional video, explain a video of the festival. And it all came together. This year. But when we relaunched, it was in 2,019 we were hit cod by COVID. And so that delayed the development. But this year we really had out stride as I mentioned and we're just gonna flick through a few slides. Where you can just get a visual of. What we're doing now in Detroit. Opening night, campus marshes. You'll see the theatre that we use, beautiful big theater, Wayne State University. And then we put on the films and then we have panelists talk about stuff. We'll get to that slide. There, and those are some characters that you know. They were debriefing the. The urban design block of films on Friday night. Directors and filmmakers come from around to support their films. We go on tours. And look at the city. And we're getting people that coming from across the country to join us. And so. What is this all leading to? So what's the point of all of this? Okay. We help us to help you. And John's gonna talk a little bit about that. And then we're gonna bring Dave in. To see how we've helped him in Petaluma and then we're gonna go to questions and answers. So. Done. How can, Can they, how can we help folks? Well, you know, I think when we renamed and rebranded, we hope to reach new audiences. And, So with, and I think it's been working. We've been working with a growing number of downtown organizations. With Main Street programs as part of Main Street America. We're an allied member of Main Street of America. We've been to 2 World W. And so. This is the Sorry, story at scale has been working as we've been able to. Take the film festival into more and more communities. So you may wonder. How to do it, right? Is that what we're on to you? Yep. Here's a few photos for recent screening events. And. Dave. They've all. Yeah, we want Dave in now because We realize some you may be wondering how to do this. How do you And step one is you go to our website. There's a button for focus screening. You can book a screen at the screen. The most popular option of the option that we offer is a That allows you to work with Josh, the original founder and festival director. To select from our library of a thousand bills. A custom playlist. Of films, you know, really designed to speak to your community and whatever challenges and issues. Then if you need to find the venue. Here's a, that shows kind of a variety of venues. You see an outdoor venue. From Mexico or they had a pedal power movies projector screening that was with place making the place making summit. You see a variety of venues, you know, a downtown. Theater works great, but there's also Kind of other rooms that you can use. To do it. And then once you've curated a custom playlist, we add that for you and send you that file and it's ready to play. For your talk. And I think the really PowerPoint experience, there's when you build more around the event like a panel. A tour, a place making festival. And, one of the hosts that did a good job of that was, Petaluma recently and we wanted to bring Dave on and talk a little bit about what they did and what their experience was. Okay. Okay, that was an awfully broad question to pose, but Probably 2 insights, the easiest things we had to do was to work with. Josh, you folks. We let out sort of what our. Thoughts were for Petaluma, he came back with a good range of films. We engaged quickly with those, went through them. I think work very quickly and effectively to come up with a real that truly did make sense. The other thing that was surprisingly easy for us was raising sponsorships between the city, other nonprofits. Professionals in town, developers. We had assumed going in that we were going to have to make this. Project break even based on ticket sales. Ticket sales were virtually irrelevant. Sponsorships alone were enough to make us. Profitable and we truly get it up with the net. Net revenues when we get done. Securing venues was actually a little more difficult. And just her figure out how to position ourselves in the community. Yeah. This was our first time, hopefully the first time of many, we are now talking about what we're going to do in 2024. And we learned a lot of lessons and we will be we will be smarter next year if we if we do proceed. One thing we're now engaged in post festival is the revenues were sufficient that we have committed Half of those revenues to a program of micro grants. Which will be announcing in the next couple of weeks. We have 8 applications for projects from tactical urbanism to alternative transportation. It's a broad range of very creative ideas and we're gonna be excited to. Fund and then use that as an opportunity to begin building toward what we do next year. Our challenges for next year. I heard broaden the audience a moment ago. I wrote that down immediately. I agree. We were talking. Mostly to urbanists rather than the broader community. We need to do better there. We need to turn even more of these good ideas into action. One of my great frustrations is all the people who came with me afterwards saying We loved this film festival. This is what you're organization should be doing next. And my response was always. No, this is what you need to be doing next, but we will give you structure to help it make it happen. With limited success thus far, but I'm still working on it. But then I guess the goals of one thought, the one thing that continues to just. Thrill me. That film festival now is what a month and a half ago. And almost 2 months ago. And yet I don't go a week without somebody coming up to be on the street who I may not even know. Saying, hey, we were at the film festival. My God, we love that. That was so cool. It was such a great evening and each time we had a had a post showing gathering with pizza and conversation and people are still just jazz by it. So it gives us momentum in the next year, but also that challenge of how do we turn that momentum into community betterment. So. Those are my thoughts. Thanks, Dave. That's brilliant. And stay on for question and answers. We're gonna get to question answers real soon. And John, you just wanna wrap us up. Yeah, meanwhile, as we've been growing, better cities, festival, first to main, You know, as a creative, we're continuing to produce. And create films. Working with Urbanists and governments and communities across the country to help tell the big story. And, we Wanna advocate for telling strict stories, so we want to help communities kill. So we offer a workshop. On how to do civic storytelling. Try to gather local storytellers. Training and the some of the techniques of what we've learned. Well, I did a TED talk. About the importance of civic story. So we want to continue to be a resource. If, if we can help you tell your civic story, we'll help you. Contact us, email, call. We'd love to just. Offer whatever we can. In the way of advice. Our consultation to help you or if you want us to come to your city. And bill it for you. We can do that too. So. Do you want to talk about the Well, I think we're gonna go to Q&A now, but, do you want to mention the bonus? Yeah, I'll mention the best contact and then go to QA. The bonus content is if you want to stay on. Content Okay. After this at the top of the hour we're gonna go another 20 min we're gonna show River City rising and then we're gonna talk you through it. Like how we as filmmakers behind the scenes put that film together. So stay for the bonus feature if you want to. If not, We appreciate you being here. So let's go to Q&A. Wonderful. Thank you so much, Chris, John and Dave. That was a really excellent presentation. I will just ask a couple questions that I had and then I'll go and open it up to audience members. The first question I had is, What are the biggest changes or developments you've seen in the films being screened since this festival first began? I'll take a shot at that. There's 2 things I think from my perspective. One is There is being, as John said, there's a lot of explainer films. That are being produced and we need explain of films we need educational films that tell people what your business is about on particular points. Some of those are really excellent and a lot of the first bunch of films were like Those explainer stuff. Some really well told. We're seeing now more this full story arc. Of film being. Submitted to the festival and being selected by us. The quality of the storytelling has gone up. In a big way over these, you know, 10 years. And for example, this year's, winning short film was by an Academy Award winning documentary filmmaker. And it's beautiful film. Called, they came from all over. That's the quality of film that is coming into into the festival the full story type type of films. And then I would say the other kind of, genre film that's coming through strong in the last couple of years. Is films that are in that civic storytelling, type of mode and are focused on, Let's say. The equity issues, the justice issues. Yes, the things that. Touching people. In that kind of area, I, when it comes to, to cities and towns and places, how can we make them inclusive? And so on. So those are the transitions that I'm thinking I'm seeing. Wonderful. That's so interesting to hear how it's kind of evolved with the storytelling aspect specifically. And I'm actually gonna turn it over to some audience questions because I think they're pretty great. I'm going to combine 2 of them. Which are one from Judith, which is or any efforts being made to engage Spanish speaking filmmakers? And with Taylor's question of are any of your films on indigenous urbanism. So just 2 different diversifying storytelling questions that I wanted to ask. Don, do you wanna take those? I, I don't know. I don't know what we've done on it. Chris. Yeah, okay. The Spanish speaking filmmakers question. Yeah, we have had. Variety of different films from Spanish filmmakers ended in the film some have been subtitled. And we encourage, you know, filmmakers from around the world to submit their films and whatever language, that is the local language of the filmmaking and subtitle them. We're happy to show those and we have shown them in the past. And. For the Indigenous? We showed, I am Kanaka. Which is was about indigenous Hawaiian culture and leadership. In this particular, edition of 2,013. And so there have been indigenous. Stories in the film festival the other one which we did this year was also about. Seagrass and about. Sales kind of like transcendental, but it was basically an environmental film because one about. Subjects is better environment. And this was a film about seagrass in. I think Sydney Harbor and it was a combination of indigenous. Caretakers. Caring for that marine environment with the local scientists and working on land use that would protect the sea grass. So on that, and obviously got into urbanism. So was that whole? You know, full orb story that included in indigenous stories. And that was also an award winning film. I think it's called, remember the title that film, John? I think it's called something Sea Grass. See, see, grass for sea change. Yeah. Sea-grass for sea change. So those are 2 indigenous stories that were in the film festival this year. And I'm thinking of other, you know, language films like when we do the. The UN Habitat bitter cities film festival. At Word of and forums. We really select from the films that are submitted a little bit more broadly than the one in Detroit, the flagship festival in Detroit. So we bring in, you know, stories from Africa, Asia, Europe, and so on and so forth and bring those languages into that. UN, venue because that's a more diverse, international audience. And so absolutely. Bring those films. Wonderful, very cool to hear about all the different ones you've been screening. I have another question here from Kaylyn Holmes who is a three-time satellite festival coordinator in St. Bass. Catherine, the St. Catharines edition. And she has a question which is any tips for how to attract wider, more diverse audience of attendees beyond usual progressive thinkers? And I think is this is a question for all 3 of you. That is an interesting question. I mean, You know, we don't have to, I don't like the picture whole people. Try to bring people out. But I know that, you know, You know, we showed a film this year. You know that, with his arbitrary lines. Subtitle. the free, free, the free spirit of Caroline. So arbitrary lines a free spurt of Caroline. So that free spurted, YMB kind of. Movement maybe a film to highlight. To bring in perhaps, you know, non progressive folks as well. I mean, there is a coalition, right? Of everybody, but if you want to bring in those. Non-progressive types that maybe a film that would kind of speak to that. Audience maybe and I could be you know, stepping on, you know, toes here, but I'm trying not to. Anyway, so. So that's one thing I could I'm thinking of. And then bring in speakers. Like if you're trying to bring in. An audience. Get a spokesperson from that particular sector of the community that people respect. And represent you into the festival so they're actually engaging with material. So they see oh That person, that pastor, for example, is coming to you and he's going to speak. At the festival or that politician or that you know city counselor is gonna come and be a part of the film festival I think so that's a part of I think I would I would share bring the diversity of speakers and presenters. To the festival and publicize those. The only thing I would add is that I differ more to Kaitlan and Dave about how to do that because these are the people on the ground hosting screens. And one of the things we've talked about doing a lot of our local host or a kind of conversation like this about, what they have found to be successful and so that they can share. There I guess about and their experience about how to do this. For each other and for the wider community that are prospectively kind of looking at doing this. Well, I can't claim that we were particularly successful at this in our year one. But our plan for year 2 is to get organized much earlier in the year and make ourselves available to groups. Who are not part of our typical constituency. From rotary clubs to church groups to minority organizations. And just offered to be there to talk about the film festival about what urban chat is. And just started building the coalition. So. Great, thank you. And that takes us right to one o'clock. So I'll just make a final plug to let you know that a recording of this webinar including the bonus session we're about to go into will be available. Within 24 h of this recording. And thank you to everybody who's been submitting some Q&A questions. Sorry, we didn't get to quite all of them. You might be able to catch some of those at the very end of this all. And I will turn it back over to Chris and John for their bonus segment. Great. Do you wanna do a couple more questions first, before we roll the film or what do you want to do, Chris? I think we should roll the film. Because I was just gonna run out of time. So let's do that. Okay. Alright. It's ready to go. And while you're setting up, I mean, I see some questions on line here. Yeah, do you know if asked about, Show description of the available films. We don't have that, but if you wanna go to the programs for the last couple of years. You'll see some descriptions of films. In the program, which is online. Well, also if you select best. The best of past real. Which is our kinda turnkey real where you don't curate to play this a custom with, but you just pick a pre build. The best of the best for that year. You'll see, thumbnails and then the title of each film that is in that. So that gives you some idea. So the film. Yeah. And some of these films are, on streaming services. You can go and find them on streaming services, you know, look up, you know, our list of films and the festival that and just go and find them if you want to. You can definitely do that. but to screen them in your classroom or whatever, just look at permissions. So yeah, some bar and many are not. So that's, that's a quick answer to that question. So let's just jump into what we're gonna. Walk through with folks right now. Spokane is an amazing place. We are the River City. Let's go ahead the place of fast moving water. I immigrated here in 2,012 from Mexico City. And I remember the first time that I saw the waterfalls here. I just felt so overwhelmed. Spokane River is the cornerstone of economic social and spiritual life in our city. It was just incredible. Hundreds of years ago thousands of years ago gathered at this sacred location to harvest our salmon. Today Spokane is still that gathering place. Spoken is special because it's near nature. It's rich history. We are a gathering place for people to thrive. Smoke can developed in the 18 hundreds. It's supposed to be the next Chicago. All the centered around the river. Shortly after the founding of the city in 1,889, there was a devastating fire. The residents of the city resolved to build back and to build even better than what had been there. And Spokane becomes the largest city between Seattle and Minneapolis. In 1,974 Spokane became the smallest city to host a World's Fair. King Cole and other civic leaders saw an opportunity to reconnect the city to the river. Now it's a place where people like to gather. It's beautiful. It just shows the resolve of the people and the resiliency of the people. I think it's the people. That makes book cancer. People will then collaborate. And help you with your dream. I love Spoken, but I love Spokane. Spoke in because there's possibility. I personally am inspired by both the courage and the industry of the those people who rebuild the city. The very first electric streetcar was built in Spokane. We began operation in Spokane. Only 4 months after the Great Fire. Spokane really grew in the in the streetcar era. That has left us with this legacy of fantastic urban neighborhoods. We are now at the Garland Theatre in the Garland District. One of the great things about Spokane is it has different neighborhoods that each have their own special qualities. It creates that sense of family. Ownership and a sense of place. We belong here. And never want to leave. People have been here for generations. I love it here. It's a great city. That's a great That's why people are coming here. It's a great city. Spokane's home crisis went up 30% of this affordable housing continues to cripple families in our community. You were millennials that can afford to buy their first houseness and affordable housing are more connected than many people. Health prices have gone up almost 30% since last year. Spokane has grown tremendously over the last 20 years. We're seeing our prices escalate. Now we have a crisis. People that get up every day and go to work should be able to afford a home and That's not the case in our city. You're looking at black community. We're seeing all-time lows. In home ownership. We're talking about the highest. Amount of people being homeless. When the young can come back to a city because they can't afford a home or the elderly can't age in place. That's going to destroy what that multi-generational rootedness here in the community. We know that supply is one factor, but building more houses the way that we have done for houses the way that we have done for say the last one factor, but building more houses the way that we have done for, say, the last 50 years, brings its own problems. If Spokane continues to sprawl, We will not have the natural resources that have sustained us. Forests and waterways. Lots of farmland, overwhelming traffic problems. If we did nothing, our environment will get paved over, frankly. If we sat on our hands and just kind of let let business as usual occur. Ultimately, I think we would we would lose something of what Spokane is. So the city collectively said, we're going to listen. We are engaged in a community conversation about housing across the whole city. All in every neighborhood. Are historical neighbourhoods like the Cliff Cannon, Manitel, Browns Edition, South Perry. Part of our effort now is to look back to those examples and incorporate that into the way that we build our city today. Was sitting past the ordinance building opportunity and choices for all. That gives us some flexibility. Today we are proposing a pilot project to immediately increase capacity for housing. Across the city of Spokane. The Spokane City Council recently passed an ordinance that allows more flexibility for accessory dwelling units or A to use. It would allow townhomes and duplexes in every residential neighborhood. It's a vision that includes affordable housing, healthy neighborhoods, economic advancement and a community working together to achieve at the highest level. That's what we're trying to get back to to do infill. To make walkable neighborhoods that missing. Middle Housing. The building types that have been allowed by zoning for the past 75 to 100 years are detached single family homes. In midrise and high rise apartment buildings. Missing middle housing can provide housing for more people. It can provide housing for more varieties of families. At a more affordable price point, they look like a single family home. From the outside you usually can't tell that there's more than one unit in it. And so they really fit into these rise walkable neighborhoods seamlessly and it can provide small business opportunities for people in our community. Now we're seeing smaller builders come into this space. Builders of different ethnic backgrounds. We've applied for from the city and are going to build 2 additional four-plex. One fourplex and one threeplex with an ADU. Right? Now I have my home that I own. I want to be an investor. With these changes, we now have the opportunity to build an ADU in the back of our home and we'll be able to live our dream, which is to have a multi-generational home where my kids can enjoy. A grandmother and also we can contribute to increasing the housing in Spoken and providing more density in our community. I can give back to the community why also building generational wealth. We didn't see this coming. But once the opportunity came about. Jumped right on. If we could solve this, it would not only save our city, but it could also be a blueprint for the country because this is something the entire country is experiencing. What an opportunity for Spokane. The work that Spokane is doing is really incredible. Spoken right now is at the brink of becoming. In if we can dream it, we can probably do it. All right, Chris. Yeah. So. You know, if you're paying attention, you saw. You know, our technique of telling a specific story. Totally embedded in that. 10 min piece. And the first thing I want to say about it is you know, there is an explain a piece to it and explain the videos normally people saying you know the Make them short, make them short. Communicate the content, educate the audience. Because they have a short attention span. But this particular story actually has an art to it. And when you tell a story that has an octet like we did, people will stay engaged. That's a 10 min video. And, and so when you tell us a longer story, that requires a time limit. That's dependent on the story. Not on a clock and supposed theory of attention span. You can tell a good story that people will watch. And keep and keep watching. So that's the first piece. And you just saw the story out pretty clearly. In that. In that film. And there was and explain a piece, but it was only, let's say, maybe a minute or so. And everything around that. You know, contribute to that and made it probably sync in. More than just an explaining a piece because it did some things emotionally prior to that piece. That took you on a journey. And you know, when you got through the story. And the journey to that little explain the piece, you were ready for it. So, That's just a kick off. To. To talking through this particular video. John, why don't you take from there? And I think, yeah, I think one of the, other things that it does is And what we try to do in these civic story films is Bring out some piece of the community's history. Where there was another crisis or the challenge they faced in their story earlier than history to show that they met that challenge that they rose to that challenge that they rose to that challenge that they rose to that channel and accomplish something before. So in this case, it was both the Spokane fire. The great fire that the distributor that town and then they rebuilt quickly. And the fact that they were able to bring the world expo, they're the smallest. So you've got we're host to world expose so this is a community that is done and accomplish incredible things. And came back from immense. You know, challenge. And today they're facing a new challenge. But by telling the story. We encourage, we instill courage in them. To make a decision to have a vision for today to say we can do this. So. I think that's an important element. Doing doing specific stories to bring out the history without that history it's gonna be harder for community to have a vision . For the future And a part of that is also belonging to the story when it's your history and you're actually become a you're the history of a town in a place. And you are part of that place now, you can connect to the history, you feel belonging. To that history. And then you're at a point. You can say, what's the future? Can I be a part of the future? Standing on the resolve and the lessons of the past. So a piece of that history is that I belong to it and people want to belong. They want to belong. And that really is a part of. Why the history piece is really is really important. Do you want to say anything else, John, in terms of the techniques and some of the pieces there? I could, but I'm happy to happy to just go to questions if there's some questions back up and. Can interact a bit. Yeah. Yeah, thank you both so much for sharing that film. That was really excellent. There's a question here from Howard Blackson. Which I think also relates to this film, which is, are there any long term thoughts? On the responsibility of being a visual library of place and town making stories that can be viewed 20 plus years from now and beyond. I think Howard's getting at something which I think we Should be doing. There was me. Pieces that of stories and and archival footage right now. That will be very helpful for us. You know, 1020 years into the future. But the senior is really not. Kind of being the archivist of that. And so potentially, you know, seeing you could, could do that. And then think through how to. How to bring that material together. How that how to catalog it. How to make it accessible and how and how to use it. And so I know with the storytellers that, you know, our part of the CNU, we've had this conversation for a long time. But maybe we're at a point now where, you know, We could do it because there's there is a demand for it and an imagination for it for it to use. So yeah, I think, you know, Howard's onto something there and would love to see that happen. This may, I would like, yeah, let's make it happen. We have, by the way, Hey. A film or 2 part film on Confessions. We did at senior 20. So it's a it's a 10 year repurpose retrospective. And we just ask people. It's seeing you 20, you know, what were some of the mistakes that the movement had made? And then that's the first film. And there's 2030 people responding to that. And the second thing was, what are your dreams for the future? And so we're gonna bring that out of the archives later, right? And put that out there. And I think that speaks to what how it is actually saying. So keep an eye on that. And Lauren, if you want to say a little word about that too, feel free because that's That's in your domain and we're really happy that you know you want to want to bring that forth. Yeah, if you keep an eye on our social media, actually within the coming couple of weeks, you'll see links to both of those films. And if you are already a CEO member, you will actually see all those 2 films, the Dreams and the Confessions in our upcoming newsletter. So also a great time to get on board with that. And I will also with that. Ask another question. This is a little bit more of a technical one from Brenda, which is how much would you budget for a film like the one we just watched? Oh, that's tough. And. You know. That is. An expansive film. Put it out there. That's expensive. That's an expensive film. And it's expensive primarily because of. You know, what's being used for. You know, and you know the ROI on that particular film is Is large and so. You have to. You know, make films. I think, with that, with that in mind. So what are you trying to achieve with the film? And and put together a story and a budget and a production. You know, creative. And so the creative in that is, you know, all the interviews, the locations, the animation, and that is all storylined, or storyboarded. Yeah, before you actually get into production. So, you know, You gotta kind of combine all these things together. To say, hey, This is. The quality of film, the production values, and the creative. That's going to achieve this particular, outcome and goals. And millions of dollars are going to get invested in, you know, this. Housing plan for the city so You know, we're a minute. Part of that investment. When, when you add it all up. But we're still expansive. So, you know. I'm not gonna give that the actual number of that particular film, but I would just give you a range. You know, but that's in the. You know, or John, do you want to say? Do you want to arrange? No, I'll leave it arranged to you, but also just that we have experienced. You know, we would want to have a conversation if we was interested. We want to have a deeper conversation about that and we have experience. Partnering with you to help. Bring sponsors together. So a lot of film specific stories we've done. Bring multiple stakeholders together. It's the fundraising, BURKE, is the then on all one. Agency or organization. It's local state headquarters coming together to fund a bill like that. But Yeah, it's 6 figures. It's that's a 6 figure, 6 figure film. Believe it that. Sounds good. And then just the last couple questions here, which was, this one's just from an anonymous attendee who is wondering if there are any ways to plug this film festival into an existing film festival. That exist in like a town or something. Already or have you ever had any experience with doing something like that? Yeah, so the flagship festival in Detroit. You know, has a Sister City across the river in Windsor and they have the a festival there, big Canadian festival there and so We've been working on a partnership to bring Our branded day or a screening. To that to that festival. And have that be. Storytelling time that can bring the architects to developers and designers and so on from Canada. To that particular festival. But with our branded. Festival as a component of it. So, so yes, it can be done. And we're doing it. It's not Common, but we've done it. We have done it and you know we we can do it. With the right kind of conversation with with the the festival. That we're bringing it to. Very cool to hear and I'll wrap it up with this one last question from Jessica who just wants to hear about a community you really saw. Transform through a story. Buffalo, you got a top buffalo, John. Yeah, I mean, a part of developing this, a story can change the city concept was really came out of my experience in Buffalo. Before that also the towns along route. 66 where I made most but Buffalo really stands out because when I arrived in Buffalo I moved there from, from the West Pills from Olympia to Washington, 2,005. And I like to tell the story of like meeting people at the local corner tavern and anyone else where I'm from. Say why did you lose a bet? Visitors who landed in Buffalo to visit would give a taxi and they ask the camera or what is there to do here in the Kadriver would say nothing. I'll give you a favor. I'll take you back to the airport for no charge. This is a city really with a kick me signed on its back. Down on the slack. You know, major population lost in kind of the story of the D industrialization and it was a Kind of a more of Rust Belt City. And. There were a lot of factors that led to kind of a renaissance and buffalo and a changing of the conversation. But certainly the films, a couple of films we made. Really catalyzed that. And we're recognized for doing that. This place matters is one you can find in a line. And Buffalo America's Special Design City, which was originally produced. As a promo to bring but it, really extended. Way we long way beyond the CNU audience. It has over a million views. And what was one of those, that, you know, we screened it. Outdoors in the summer. Over 1,000 people showed up the mayor was there. And a lot of people You know, remember that and and call a turning point in terms of. The community kind of seeing itself in a new light. So that a lot of many other people's efforts. Was an example I think of a story Really changing a city. I would just add to that. Those of tent poll stories. But there's been consistent focus storytelling. That we have been doing in Buffalo for 1015 years or more. That have added to that temple large story. And stories about, you know, the Black Jazz Club and the restaurant scene and the and the beer scene and the architecture and small so and the community of storytellers. And so it's It's tell the big story, the civic story, and then develop a culture of consistently telling stories. About your place and your city in your town. So there's no one. You know, story that's gonna turn it the city around, but storytelling. Consistently conceived. We'll do it. Example of that. Yep. And another Another film we another film we did was about a small town called Tanano in the northwest and that's an example of not our film, the change that made the change, but the fact the community knew its story was instrumental in it. Overcoming the use challenge that they face during COVID. So they drew on their sense of their own history and they knew their own story and dove in the past and found a solution that moving forward and that's an example of a community. That, because they knew their specific story. Were empowered to meet the challenge of. COVID, the pandemic. And kinda how it hit their main street. So that's another good example. Small town. Very awesome. 2 very distinct, very wonderful stories. I'm being told. And I guess with that, it's been great having you guys and we're gonna go ahead and wrap this up as I mentioned at the top of the hour this will be available via recording within 24 h. And thank you again Chris, Dave and John for joining us for On the Park Bench today. Thanks for having us. It's great to be here. Yeah. Have a wonderful rest of your day.