April 2026 - Cvsg - list.chattanooga.digital

CVSG Regular Meeting, Tuesday, May 5th agenda
by Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. April 30, 2026

April 30, 2026

For those who did not make it to our last dialogue on housing, one of the key insights, beyond the insights into our current housing issues, was the value of games as learning exercises. This is a prime example of how we might improve community venturing, building on practices from the past. The challenge is to translate that talk into action: What do we do with insights from learning exercises? How to we effectively act on our knowledge as and for the community? This is something Venture did amazingly well, about which I think we still have a lot to learn. That is one of my personal learning objectives. The preliminary agenda for our next meeting is: Review our purpose and proposed shift in focus to applied learning How might we genuinely engage community members to increase incomes and prosperity by connecting existing efforts throughout the community? Walk through online platforms venturing.chattanooga.digital (Discourse) for Study Group purposes, including documenting Venture and related initiatives and supporting community venturing as a practice Bring your laptop or use your smart phone Create an account via https://venturing.chattanooga.digital/invites/yHMGvGCeCb in.chattanooga.digital (Friendica, which is like an community-owned Facebook) for general community purposes, specifically for engaging, hearing from, and sharing insights of community members To be used by the Facilitator Bank and open to the local public Plans for the Facilitator Bank Announce open applications, cost, and structure Discuss timeframe and milestones Chattanooga Venturing Dialogues Next dialogue on “Central Places and Urban Design and Development," June 1, Waterhouse Pavilion Move to a webinar/podcast format with small in-person groups How to incorporate connecting and learning activities Regular Study Group meetings Move discussions and meetings online via Discourse and Nextcloud Talk Let me know of any other items to cover or any input/questions you might have for any of the above. — Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. Executive Officer and Principal Eduity, LLC www.eduity.net greg(a)eduity.net 706-271-5521

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Re: Last night's Chattanooga Venturing Dialogue... and next week's regular meeting
by Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. April 28, 2026

April 28, 2026

Thanks for the feedback! Addressing several replies together… > On Apr 28, 2026, at 12:18 PM, Arch Willingham <a.willingham(a)tuparks.com> wrote: > > I think y’all need to keep pushing the concept of “The next version of Chattanooga will be crafted by you!”. I LOVE that, Arch! But… what is the means for that? See my response to Jack, below, for more on this. (Spoiler alert: reviving the Facilitator Bank, using a dedicated, local, public online platform.) > On Apr 28, 2026, at 12:42 PM, Audrey Ramsey <aramsey3(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > I think CNE is a well kept secret. More PR is needed for CNE especially during these tough economic times and the housing crisis we face today. I hoped the topic would draw in more people for this very purpose! CNE definitely is not as well known as it should be. It is such an amazing, effective organization. Maybe it's because they have been rather focused. Maybe it’s because we simply don’t have good community media. Bigger picture, I would personally love to see the Study Group evolve into a network for sharing information about resources like CNE but I really think we need to LISTEN first and foremost, not tell. Once people have told us about their goals, issues, needs, after we have listened to and shared their concerns and ideas, then we can tell them about resources. > On Apr 28, 2026, at 11:48 AM, Tricia King Mims <tricia(a)nppcha.org> wrote: > > I think the cost is a deterrent as a few people have told me they would have come to my talk with Sally and Eleanor had it been free. There is a no-cost registration option for our public events — registrants simply have to put “0” in the amount field for “Attendee” ticket — and we welcome folks who have not registered (and don’t ask them to pay an attendance fee, although that’s likely to change in the future to cover our costs). > On Apr 28, 2026, at 11:05 AM, Jack Zibluk <jackzibluk(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > My overvalued 2 cents is that Ventures at this point is made up of non-profits and community groups and individuals with great ideas and valid concerns, but 1) an "action plan" or similar framework of translating concerns into actions hasn't come together and 2) there doesn't seem to be a lot of buy-in from the political community, River City Co., the chamber of commerce or other folks whose support would be necessary to put concerns into action. The plan (program) for 2026 is to (1) establish an online platform, (2) hold regular meetings, and (3) host topical dialogue sessions. We are working on all of those and welcome any help. Remember that the Study Group is an informal group, Jack. It has no real structure or capacity. I have done most of the leg work, supported Eleanor, Kate, Philip, a few folks who have helped engage stakeholders like those you mention in 2, and, of course, our speakers and dialogue participants. The Study Group's purpose has always been to learn about how to do community engagement, not to actually engage people and document/share their concerns. We simply do not have capacity for that. That said, there seems to be strong interest in "hearing the voice of the community." That is why I’m reviving the Facilitator Bank. It will have formal expectations of participants and will be more structured. The Study Group can advise, guide, and support facilitators. If you have other thoughts on how to do this, I’m all ears! What do you think we should ask for/expect as buy-in from stakeholders? Representatives of the groups you mention have attended Study Group events and meetings. River City Co is co-producing/hosting our next dialogue. I’m sure others would participate if invited but, again, we have limited capacity that. I’m doing what I can, roughly following Venture’s timeline. We have gotten a lot of encouragement but I have not seen any interest in funding this work or supporting in any substantive way. — GL

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Last night's Chattanooga Venturing Dialogue... and next week's regular meeting
by Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. April 28, 2026

April 28, 2026

Thanks to Chris Thompson and the CNE team for the program last night! It was very informative. I thought the learning games were especially interesting as an engagement practice. They definitely helped folks — some of whom had deep experience with the topic — understand the issues. With a bit of tweaking, learning exercises like that could become powerful catalysts for collaborative action. They are a bit labor-intensive but that issue could be addressed by creating generic versions or templates for facilitators to use without any/much pre-work. Unfortunately, it was not as well attended as past sessions. Does anyone have any thoughts about why? Was it lack of a Venture-era “celebrity” to anchor the discussion and/or singular focus on CNE? Is the topic just not that important or interesting? Surely not! Did we just not reach the right audience? My goal is for the dialogues to be interesting and useful to activists and change-makers, especially as we consider changing format. Any input or suggestions would be greatly appreciated! Our next regular meeting, next Tuesday, May 5, at noon, will focus on means to address our new focus and goal. Based on your input the Study Group’s goals are to build community infrastructure for engaging people and to connect causes, initiatives, and organizations in the community. Rather than telling people what’s happing, our goal is to hear about and share others’ goals, issues, needs, opportunities, and resources. Basically, we’re applying lessons learned from Venture and similar initiatives to learn-by-doing about community venturing, we’re facilitating community problem-solving rather than just providing solutions. The proposed focus is how to increase incomes and prosperity in our community, guided by the question, “how might we do better and make more?” — Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. Executive Officer and Principal Eduity, LLC www.eduity.net greg(a)eduity.net 706-271-5521

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Recent community engaged planning/visioning efforts
by Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. April 26, 2026

April 26, 2026

I have recently learned (or been reminded) about a couple of community engaged planning/visioning efforts. The Chamber of Commerce worked with community groups and businesses to create a plan for the future in 2019/2020, called Velocity 2040 <https://chattanoogachamber.com/velocity2040/>, to make Chattanooga-Hamilton County "a place where we all succeed together.” River City Company developed the ONE Riverfront District Plan <https://www.rivercitycompany.com/one-riverfront> in 2022 to "create a place for all Chattanoogans to enjoy” including the "civic responsibility to improve social and economic equity.” This was followed by more focused plans for the Riverfront parks (Ross’s Landing, etc.) and Hawk’s Hill (currently site of AT&T field). These are in addition to the City’s One Chattanooga plan <https://chattanooga.gov/stay-informed/one-chattanooga> of 2022 for “a community where all Chattanoogans can thrive and prosper” and Plan Hamilton <https://planhamilton.org/> for "sustainable and responsible growth that preserves the unique and cultural aspects of the county” that was adopted in 2025. Are you aware of these? How might we build on these? Should we study them? Should we use them as a jumping off point for our efforts? My sense from the group is that our goal is not to plan or strategize for a particular purpose (or revist previous planning). Our goals are just to listen, connect, and build infrastructure for engagement. Is that right? — Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. Executive Officer and Principal Eduity, LLC www.eduity.net greg(a)eduity.net 706-271-5521

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Focus the Study Group on how to do better and make more?
by Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. April 26, 2026

April 26, 2026

There’s been a bit of feedback on the group’s “North Star” — engage people to connect various efforts to address community issues. Might it make sense to focus it on work: how to create jobs and increase incomes via entrepreneurship and small business. How do we develop our local talent and enable our talented people to capitalize on their creativity, knowledge, and skills? “Work” was a general topic of Venture that did not get as much attention as the other topics. It is a really critical general issue for our community, especially with the County Mayor wanting to close the BDC. I think we would get some very powerful and useful insights from the community if we asked and listened. What to you think? Bad idea? Good idea? Thoughts about how and where to do this and who to engage? Also, please spread the word about the dialogue session on Monday. — Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. Executive Officer and Principal Eduity, LLC www.eduity.net greg(a)eduity.net 706-271-5521

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Housing dialogue session on Monday
by Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. April 21, 2026

April 21, 2026

Our next dialogue session is this coming Monday, April 27th, 5:30 PM (doors open at 5:00). It will focus on housing and be anchored by Chris Thompson, president and CEO of CNE. You can get additional information and register online at https://luma.com/oo948apo. Please share! — Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. Executive Officer and Principal Eduity, LLC www.eduity.net greg(a)eduity.net 706-271-5521

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Chattanooga Venturing Study Group's "North Star"
by Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. April 15, 2026

April 15, 2026

During our discussion at the last CVSG regular meeting about refocusing on active, applied learning, Tricia asked about the Study Group’s “North Star.” The other day Becca Dunston, a new participant in the group, emailed me with the suggestion of using “how do we?” questions to guide our effort. She had several good specific questions for dialogue topics. In general, she suggested asking “how do we build genuine community engagement that connects the fragmented efforts already underway rather than adding another siloed initiative?” I think this is a great “North Star” for the group, an ideal way to focus our learning. It makes lessons from Venture very relevant but also focuses us on where we want to go. The key implication is that our objective requires identifying as many “efforts already underway” as possible and relating them to each other, ideally via direct, interpersonal connections and collaboration. For “genuine community engagement,” I think we can use the fundamental rationales for community engagement as criteria: How do we tap into the capabilities and intelligence that distributed throughout the community? How do we get community members to buy into and support efforts? How do we facilitate collaboration to maximize community benefits and reduce duplication of efforts and risk of conflict? What do you think? — Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. Executive Officer and Principal Eduity, LLC www.eduity.net greg(a)eduity.net 706-271-5521

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Follow-up to today's regular meeting and next steps
by Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. April 7, 2026

April 7, 2026

Thanks, all, for your continued interest in learning from Chattanooga Venture about engaging and mobilizing community members for inclusive, positive, sustainable change. The discussion today confirmed my thinking about evolving the group into a network, which means (1) we all contribute and coordinate while (2) we all do our own things and (3) we connect others who are working for inclusive, positive, sustainable change. Going forward I’m going to personally focus on listening to the voice of the community as a representative of Chattanooga.Digital—our new community tech cooperative… and the world’s first digital utility! Chattanooga.Digital will provide the software infrastructure for this, the means for people to connect, engage, and share, as a community service. It’s literally our mission. The Study Group will transition from in-person meetings to the online platform, venturing.chattanooga.digital. Our next regular Study Group meeting on May 5th will be an on-boarding session for the platform, to get everyone signed up and familiar with its features and functions. You can join Venturing.Chattanooga.Digital now by clicking here <https://venturing.chattanooga.digital/invites/xQEhVNYuDG>! I will administer it and train others to do so. Chattanooga.Digital will have workshops for the platform (Discourse <https://discourse.org/>) because we’ll provide it to any community group that needs a forum. The platform is quite powerful but also rather generic at the moment. If anyone we want to add content and/or customize it, Chattanooga.Digital can facilitate that. Chattanooga Venturing will continue as a collaborative network to do what Venture did: Channel the voice of the community and connect people to learn and work together. This is something Chattanooga.Digital needs and I suspect others do, too. We need capacity and tools for that. I see an opportunity as well as a need here, so I plan to revive the Facilitator Bank as an entrepreneur through my company, Eduity. We will open source all of the tools, etc., for anyone to use My objective is to build the capabilities for the community and cover my costs; this is not going to be a money-making, exclusive, high-dollar program! If anyone is interested in participating or partnering on the Facilitator Bank, please reach out! The dialogues will shift to a livestream/podcast format after this month. Philip Luckey and I will produce these. We encourage others to join in and replicate them. The format will be “open source” so that anyone can host dialogues in conjunction with or separate from what we’re doing. Chattanooga.Digital will provide apps and services to support this, too, and we will coordinate and share via the Venturing platform. We will be looking for topics, sponsors, and locations. If you have any suggestions, please reach out about that. Thanks, again, for your in-person participation and interest. Let’s take it to the next level! Join the network, continue to connect and share. — Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. Executive Officer and Principal Eduity, LLC www.eduity.net greg(a)eduity.net 706-271-5521

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CVSG Regular Meeting agenda for 3/7
by Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. April 7, 2026

April 7, 2026

We have five new members to the group. Welcome! We now have over 70 people on this list! The next regular meeting of the Chattanooga Venturing Study Group will focus on two things: reviving the Facilitator Bank and your objectives. We will also talk about dialogues and online presence. The Chattanooga Facilitator Bank What is it? A group of trained facilitators for the community Where did it come from? Chattanooga Venture! What’s involved? A formal training program, support services, and tools Your learning objectives Review of learning objectives from last meeting How can the Study Group and Facilitator Bank help? Where should we focus our learning? What are key points of engagement? How do we get broader and deeper into the community? Chattanooga Venturing Dialogues Housing dialogue planned for April 27 with CNE Possible dialogue on urban design and development with River City in early June Shift to podcast format with limited in-person audience after that to reduce work required Online presence Venturing.Chattanooga.Digital <https://venturing.chattanooga.digital/> will be the Study Group’s online home. Discussions/forums about relevant topics Content related to Chattanooga Venture and related initiatives Coordinate Facilitator Bank activities Community social network for public purposes Pages on Chattanooga.Digital website for public “front door" Let me know of any other issues or topics to address. I’ll send a final agenda on Monday. — Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. Executive Officer and Principal Eduity, LLC www.eduity.net greg(a)eduity.net 706-271-5521

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A network to apply lessons from Chattanooga Venture
by Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. April 6, 2026

April 6, 2026

The purpose of the Chattanooga Venturing Study Group is to learn from Venture about how to engage and mobilize community members for inclusive, positive, sustainable change. Participants in the study group represent a wide range of efforts and initiatives to improve our community, which can cause things to be fragmented, inconsistent, and uncoordinated. The power of Venture was its open visioning process coupled with dedication and means to turn talk into action, to make things happen, to instigate change by acting together, collaboratively, including: A bank of trained facilitators to support the process A simple, flexible, fair process for gathering input A team of "connected champions" leading the effort Open, quasi-public spaces Small to large group public goal setting Support and buy-in from those in control of resources Task forces for goals I think the Study Group should refocus on actively applying lessons from Venture, starting with "listening to the voice of the community.” And I think we should intentionally reorganize as a network rather than just an informal, leader-led group. We do not have the resources to create an organization like Venture but we can apply its practices. We can and should do what it did! As a network, we would all work in a connected yet independent manner, informed by and in support of each other. I don’t think we can really learn about Venture without actually doing community venturing. That starts with understanding common challenges and shared visions, with listening to people and letting them know they have been heard, that their input matters. It’s really about connecting, creating, learning, and sharing to achieve our goals, address our issues and needs, tap our opportunities and resources. Right? Reorganizing as a network doesn’t really require a change in what we’re doing, it just means doing it more intentionally and purposively. It means recognizing that we are part of something bigger and more impactful than a specific cause, that all good causes complement each other. The role of the network is to connect various initiatives, to guide and support those that generate community value, that achieve our goals, address our issues and needs, tap our opportunities and resources. The first step is to start listening, to establish the means and process for connecting with people, hearing the voice of the community, identifying challenges and seeing a shared vision. What do you think about refocusing on doing, starting with listening, as a network? Personally, it’s where I want to go and what I plan to invest in. I think it’s still important to preserve knowledge from Venture, and the network should support that, but we should really focus on doing what Venture did without requiring or waiting on a formal organization to do it. We'll discuss on Tuesday but share your thoughts in the meantime! — Greg Laudeman, Ed.D. Executive Officer and Principal Eduity, LLC www.eduity.net greg(a)eduity.net 706-271-5521

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