The Madisonville Community Studio is an ongoing project co-created by Madisonville residents and
Design Impact (DI) to explore key questions about the inclusiveness of neighborhood changes. The project is supported by the
Kresge Foundation.
In 2019, a group of Madisonville residents, community workers, and small business owners came together to explore two key questions with one another through a project called the Madisonville Community Studio:
- How might we improve connections among Madisonville residents across race?
- How might we ensure Madisonville’s Black residents have power, influence, and representation regarding decisions affecting the community?
To improve interracial relationships in Madisonville and increase Black residents’ power, influence, and representation in the neighborhood’s development decisions, the Community Studio participants developed and tested (or prototyped) three ideas:
- Black-owned Business Coalition
- Redesigning Community Council
- “Meet Your Neighbors” Icebreaker
To share these prototypes with the community, the studio participants hosted a storytelling event on March 7, 2020, revealing the ideas they tested and discussing what they learned through the project.
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| Madisonville Community Studio participants and storytelling event attendees mingle at the event |
BLACK-OWNED BUSINESS COALITION
Members of the Black Owned Business Coalition test team sought to gauge interest in their prototype by speaking with community members, business owners, and entrepreneurs in Madisonville and across Cincinnati. Three main goals identified for this concept were:
- Build power for each individual business and collectively, sharing resources and support
- Influence and create equitable processes to access resources through existing mechanisms (i.e. Chamber)
- Policy and system-level advocacy
The team wanted to learn if people liked the idea and what people liked most about it. The group learned that there is interest in this idea and that folks want the coalition to grow, citing a black-owned business coalition would give [black-owned businesses and entrepreneurs] an opportunity to access information for their businesses to grow that they otherwise would not have. Folks surveyed also said they want the coalition to provide an educational network and help introduce [black-owned businesses and entrepreneurs] to the community.
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| Members of the Black-Owned Business Coalition team share how their prototype was received in the community |
REDESIGNING COMMUNITY COUNCIL
The Redesigning Community Council team set out to answer How do we make community council meetings better? How do we inspire community engagement? They found the best way to begin tackling these questions was to invite a diverse group of community members to a couple of community council meetings and offering food and childcare to help curb at least some potential barriers.
The team learned that there are a number of reasons residents don't regularly attend the meetings including not feeling connected to others, not having time to attend, and not knowing or feeling connected to the issues. The team learned that residents would appreciate more options like additional or Saturday meetings, starting the council meetings 30 minutes earlier, and childcare at all meetings. They also learned that many residents didn’t know that the council meetings are streamed online and can be joined from anywhere.
As a result of running this prototype, a number of Madisonville Community Studio participants are planning to attend more committee meetings to be more vocal and get more involved. Madisonville Community Council President and community studio member who served on this team, Kate Botos, said that running the prototype provided a lot of information on how to offer better meetings. She says she plans to introduce some of the suggested changes at future meetings.
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| Members of the Redesigning Community Council team talk about their prototype |
"MEET YOUR NEIGHBORS" ICEBREAKER
With all of the changes happening in Madisonville recently and over the past few years, this team wanted to see how bringing residents together — both newer residents and those who'd lived in the community for a long time — could help community members get to know their neighbors and explore what it means to come together and share each other's gifts with no expectations beyond connecting and learning more about one another.
The team stressed the importance of holding space to meet with people across race and being intentional about meeting with people they wouldn’t necessarily normally meet with. They thought it was critical to find a way to do that and this prototype was a perfect way to do this with intention.
The result was a success. The team held a dinner at a Madisonville Community Studio member's home and invited a number of residents representing a diverse race and age range to join them for a 90-minute facilitated conversation. One team member shared, "We got [neighbors] together and it worked. We weren’t just shooting the breeze about growing roses and walking our dogs. We talked about substance – [we talked about] the changes in the neighborhood." Because of their evening together, the group hopes to create a neighborhood directory and continue creating ways to connect with one another.
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| The "Meet Your Neighbors" team discuss their prototype results |
The storytelling event concluded with a poignant spoken word piece performed by MC and artist Laurent Che and closing remarks from the event's planners and Madisonville community studio members and residents Miranda Millard and Bridalveil Powell.
All of the teams plan to continue exploring their prototypes into the months to come.
Written by Desiré Bennett, Senior Social Equity Specialist at Design Impact.
Photos from event:
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| The storytelling event was held in Madisonville at Artsville |
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| Artsville owner Kathy Garrison chats with an event attendee |
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| Attendees enjoy food offerings |
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| DI team members Desiré Bennett and Robin A. Wright secure a Madisonville timeline created in the Madisonville Community Studio while attendees engage in an activity |
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| Madisonville Community Studio participants and event attendees mingle and chat |
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| Madisonville Community Council President and community studio member Kate Botos |
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| DI Director of Community Development and Strategy Sarah Corlett |
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| Madisonville Community Studio member, and one of the event's planners, Miranda Millard |
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| Madisonville Community Studio member, and one of the event's planners, Bridalveil Powell |
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| From L-R: Spoken word artist Jugh Jefner, Madisonville Community Studio member and spoken word artist Acyyion Ace AKA Marko Powell, Bridalveil Powell, the evening's MC & spoken word artist Laurent Che, and Miranda Millard |
