Summary:
Our guest today is Evan White, Communications Officer for the Venice Neighborhood Council. Evan is a public relations professional who is applying his skills with one of the most engaged and active Neighborhood Councils in the City. In our conversation, Evan talks about Venice’s unique place in Los Angeles, his role in helping his Neighborhood Council thrive, and his hopes for the future of Neighborhood Council elections. We hope you enjoy!
Public Relations (PR) and Neighborhood Councils
As a public relations professional, Evan White helps place clients in the media, use their own social media, and raise their brand awareness, just to name a few things. Evan has had a lot of success using his PR background to raise awareness about his own Neighborhood Council in Venice. If your Neighborhood Council needs some awareness or profile raising, consider doing some research on PR basics!
Venice Neighborhood Council Cityhood Committee
Evan talked about how Venice Neighborhood Council facilitated discussions about what it would mean for Venice to form (or re-form) its own City. They did that through their “Cityhood Committee,” whose mission is “To examine the benefits, costs and applications of cityhood as a governmental option for the residents of Venice as opposed to remaining part of the city of Los Angeles.” You can read more about the Venice secession efforts here.
Neighborhood Council Election Reforms
In early 2019, the City Council voted on a series of reforms, one of which asked to explore the possibility of holding all Neighborhood Council elections on the same day, rather than the traditional region-by-region approach. For the 2019 elections, Neighborhood Councils were broken down into 13 separate regions, some of which had their elections on the same dates.
EmpowerLA’s monthly podcast is produced by Arin Abedian and hosted by Brett Shears.
The views expressed in the EmpowerLA Podcast do not necessarily reflect those of EmpowerLA or the City of Los Angeles. The veracity of any claims made during the recording are the sole responsibility of the host and guest(s).
