The Knight Cities Challenge has announced a list of 37 winners that will share $5 million in grants to make their cities better places. The contest looks for ideas that will help cities keep talented people, expand economic opportunity, and create a culture of civic engagement. San Jose had two winners this year, each taking home $100,000:
Post Street Night Market by Justin Triano | $100,000
Expanding economic opportunity with a recurring night market that features local crafts, food and entertainment.
The MayFeria by Mexican Heritage Plaza | $100,000 | submitted by Tamara Alvarado
Increasing civic engagement and expanding economic opportunity in San Jose’s Mayfair neighborhood with The MayFeria, which will consist of folk life events, a community task force, and a coordinator to help identify and make better use of cultural and civic assets
Congrats to both of the winners! I'm especially excited about the new night market on Post Street. For the press release, read on.
Knight Cities Challenge awards $5 million for ideas to make cities more successful
MIAMI — The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation today announced that 37 innovative projects will share $5 million as winners of the Knight Cities Challenge. Each of the ideas centers on helping cities attract and keep talented people, expand economic opportunities and create a culture of civic engagement.
The challenge attracted more than 4,500 ideas to make the 26 communities where Knight invests more vibrant places to live and work. It asked innovators of all kinds to answer the question: What’s your best idea to make cities more successful?
The 37 winners proposed a host of ideas, from exploring Detroit’s untold history through monthly bike tours that blend storytelling with neighborhood discovery to using hip-hop to provide hands-on business training to members of low-income groups in Philadelphia, from developing a toolkit to create temporary pop-up social spaces at voting polls in Long Beach to creating a new cultural hub in West Palm Beach’s Northwest Historic District.
“At its core, the Knight Cities Challenge is about discovering and connecting civic innovators, creative interventionists who inspire positive change,” said Alberto Ibargüen, Knight Foundation president. “The winners reflect this goal. Their ideas have the potential to create stronger communities and spaces that spur learning, engagement and growth.”
Open to any individual, business, government or nonprofit, the Knight Cities Challenge has just two rules: (1) A submission may come from anywhere, but the project must take place in or benefit one or more of the 26 communities where Knight invests and (2) the idea should focus on one or more of three drivers of city success: Talent: Ideas that help cities attract and keep talented people; Opportunity: Ideas that create economic prospects by breaking down divides and making new connections; Engagement: Ideas that spur connection and civic involvement.
Winning projects are based in 19 of the 26 communities where Knight invests including: Akron, Ohio; Boulder, Colo.; Columbus, Ga.; Charlotte, N.C.; Detroit; Gary, Ind.; Ft. Wayne, Ind.; Grand Forks, N.D.; Lexington, Ky.; Macon, Ga.; Miami; Long Beach, Calif.; Milledgeville, Ga.; Palm Beach County, Fla.; Philadelphia; St. Paul, Minn.; San Jose, Calif; State College, Pa; and Tallahassee, Fla.
The challenge launched in October 2015. Finalists were announced in January.
This is the second year of the Knight Cities Challenge. In March 2015 Knight announced 32 winners of the inaugural Knight Cities Challenge. The 2015 challenge winners have created innovative solutions aimed at connecting people of all backgrounds and incomes, inviting people into active civic engagement and helping keep and attract talented people in their communities. They include: the Pop-Up Pool Project, which reimagines Philadelphia’s city pools as neighborhood assets that attract a broad range of people of all incomes and backgrounds; Re:Brand Detroit, which aims to spark reinvestment in Detroit’s neighborhoods through entrepreneurship; and Minimum Grid Maximum Impact, which improves neighborhood life by creating a network of bike and pedestrian connections between Midtown and Uptown Columbus, Ga.
The challenge will reopen for submissions in fall 2016.
2016 Knight Cities Challenge Winners
San Jose, Calif.
Post Street Night Market by Justin Triano | $100,000
Expanding economic opportunity with a recurring night market that features local crafts, food and entertainment.
The MayFeria by Mexican Heritage Plaza | $100,000 | submitted by Tamara Alvarado
Increasing civic engagement and expanding economic opportunity in San Jose’s Mayfair neighborhood with The MayFeria, which will consist of folk life events, a community task force, and a coordinator to help identify and make better use of cultural and civic assets
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About the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
Knight Foundation supports transformational ideas that promote quality journalism, advance media innovation, engage communities and foster the arts. The foundation believes that democracy thrives when people and communities are informed and engaged. For more, visit
www.knightfoundation.org.
