Architecture, And: Civic Leadership

A This episode is sponsored by Monograph and Arc IT. You'll hear more about them later on in the episode. I'm Evelyn Lee. And I'm Janine Chastain.

B We're collaborating on curated conversations to explore how the industry of architecture is changing.

A Together, we'll find ways to create new solutions to current challenges while elevating the value of architects. Welcome to Practice Disrupted. Hello, listeners. Hello, Janine.

B Hey, Evelyn. Hey, disruptors. In preparing for today's episode, it was really challenging to decide where to start this introduction because our guests have quite the resume of leadership experiences. But since this is kind of an AIS reunion, it only seems there to start, with talking about the American Institute of Architecture Students and their leadership role coming out of that organization early in their careers. So for those who don't know, the AIAS is an organization that represents all the architecture and design students across the United States. And our guests started their careers in architecture, in national leadership positions after graduating from the University of Maryland and the University of Arkansas. Since that early point in their careers, they've both taken on new and challenging roles that bridge architecture and civic leadership.

A Yeah. I'm really excited about this episode because I know there are a lot of individuals out there that are interested in talking about career transitions, maybe even out of practice. And we're told when we graduate from architecture school that we can do anything with an architectural background. But it's actually really hard to find those individuals that have trained as architects and have gone on to do something outside of traditional practice and outside of roles that traditionally support traditional practice. So real estate, manufacturing, or working on the manufacturer dealer side, owners rep, facilities, etcetera. These 2 are operating in a space that are creating real and meaningful change at the community level, which is another area that I feel so much of the younger generations, generation y and z, want to be a bigger part of.

B So when I think of our guests today, Trinity and Jake, I think of the word leadership. And in their current leadership roles, Trinity is the executive director of the Mayor's Institute on City Design, and Jake Day is now known as mayor Day, the mayor of Salisbury, Maryland. In our conversation today, we're going to focus on their careers, topics on leadership, and their and the role that they see for architects and designers in shaping our communities. So without further ado, let's jump to the interview. So we

A usually ask people at the beginning to introduce themselves. And because Janine wanted to pin this all the way back to AIAS, do you wanna start with maybe what your role was in AIAS and go a little bit deeper into the title she just mentioned right now. Trinity, since you're laughing so hard, I'm gonna start with you.

C Sure. I'm Trinity Simonson back in what year was that? 2004? I was the national vice president of the American Institute of Architecture Students. So, as Janine alluded to, that's a kind of full time paid position in DC involved representing architecture students to academia, to the profession. And I think I speak for for both of us when I say that it it set the trajectory of my career.

D So, my name is Jake Day. I'm the mayor of Salisbury. But 2,004, 2005, I was the president of the American Institute of Architecture Students. And I was so impressed by the people who came before me and people that I worked with, like Trinity. And what they did was they inspired me to be more engaged in a life of civic practice. I didn't know at the time what it would mean, but I cared about the impact that design and architecture could have, and I cared about it enough that I wanted to incorporate it in whatever I did, even if I didn't go into traditional practice. And, also, I think, I gotta be honest, it as Trinity said, it sets a course for your career, and it did mine as well. It also probably drew me away from traditional practice in a way that a different first job might not.

B It's easy for me to start this story there because when I was coming up through AIS, you both were, like, just, I don't know, everybody looked up to you. You guys were ahead of us. You were taking that step from AIS into your careers, and we were all watching what you were doing. So I know that there are a lot of legacy friends out there listening, but also others might be interested to know about that early connection into architecture. And you guys have done so much with your careers to be at the point that you are right now. Let's look at where you are and, Trinity, I wanna start with you and talk about the Mayor's Institute on City Design because I think that'll frame this conversation. Tell our listeners about the organization, and what's your role as executive director?

C Sure. And I'll just add to that. Transition happened, very directly for me after my vice president year because my first, job after that was actually as the program manager for the the first time the mayor's institute hired a number 2. And as I was trying to figure out what my next step was gonna be after AIS, I knew, you know, I wasn't terribly interested in being a capital a architect and that I was really inter interested in this intersection between politics and policy and ideas and implementation. I was at the institute for a couple of years before I went to graduate school, did some other stuff, and came back as the executive director of the institute about 10 years ago, and I feel really have found my career home with this organization. But but the mayor's institute itself is this really amazing, mostly under the radar kind of program. We were founded in 1986 with the basic premise that the mayor is the city's chief urban designer. You can imagine that for all the reasons that people run for office, this one often isn't at the forefront.

C Can we think have the most lasting impact. So we're a leadership initiative of the National Endowment For the Arts that's in partnership with the United States Conference of Mayors. In essence, we are a leadership development training program for mayors, and our bread and butter program is what we call an MICD session, an institute session. So at those meetings, we bring a small group, generally about 6 to 8 mayors together with a small group of design and development professionals we call the design and development professionals, we call them our resource team, give presentations from their areas of expertise, and they represent the kind of wide variety of the allied professions of city making. So architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, real estate development, economic development, community development. It's it's totally closed door. There's no press, no additional staff. The members of our resource team sign agreements that say they won't seek work on the project that the mayor brought for at least a year after the institute.

C Design field consider it to be an honor to be asked to participate. And all of those moves are really about creating a safe space where mayors can get very candid very quickly and talk about their their challenges. You know, mayors always say that they learn as much from, each other's challenges as they do their own. And our resource team always tells us that they leave, well, often leave optimistic about our cities and our communities, but also with a, you know, a kind of renewed appreciation for the political challenges that our our elected leaders face. So that's our main program. Before the pandemic, we were doing about 6 of these a year, working with nearly 50 mayors a year. In the history of the program, we've worked with over 1200 mayors, over 700 design and development professionals. But, of course, during the pandemic, we had to pivot that programming to be delivered in a way that was, like, meaningful and timely and useful, and you can imagine that that even during the period of over those 2 years, those needs have changed dramatically, and and so have the capacities of mayors to participate in virtual offerings.

C But through our structure, we had very stable funding during the pandemic. So we created this whole new suite of programs. So some were rousing successes. Others, we learned and adapted as we went. We did virtual seminars for mayors. We did an advanced technical assistance program for alumni mayors that give them a gave them a kinda 8 week opportunity to work with some of the best designers in the country on either their case study project, a COVID 19 project, or project about racial justice in the built environment. And we also created this new fellowship program for mayor exclusively about dealing with racial justice in the built environment. And now as we're moving back into in person programming, we're trying to balance what we've already been doing well for decades with these new programs that were also clearly filling a need.

A Before we jump into to Jake and where he's ended up, so you 2 are both participating in MICD, MICD, Just City Mayoral Fellowship right now. So what is the program can you tell us a little bit more about what that particular program is about?

C Yeah. So this is the fellowship program, that I spoke about before. We call it the MICD Just City Mayoral Fellowship, and a few weeks ago, we launched our 2nd cohort of this. This program was an idea of mine that was sparked at a gathering that Tony Griffin held on racial justice in the built environment at the Harvard Graduate School of Design back in spring of 2019. And basically, my my kind of germ of an idea at the time was, like, what if we had legions of mayors trained in the impacts that planning and policy and design decisions have had on reinforcing structural inequities in our society? We didn't have much of an outlet for that at that point, but during the early days of the pandemic, Toni reached back out to the group that had been assembled at that convening the year before, and and I immediately sent her back this idea, and then we just started running with it. And I it feels like from the time we talked first until we launched it, it was just a few weeks. I think it was realistically more like 6 to 8 weeks. It's still very fast.

C We were designing the curriculum, recruiting mayors, figuring out the kind of nuts and bolts of the program, and we launched the 1st cohort in summer of 2020. It was a 100% virtual. We had 7 mayors and the curriculum focused on grounding knowledge, so how we got to where we are today, and then helping mayors navigate the recovery of COVID 19 with a justice lens. Our 2nd class kicked off in February. We had intended that to be in fall of 2021, but Delta had other plans for us. And the focus of this group is more tailored towards how to use historical funding streams, in part, the $65,100,000,000 that cities and, counties of all sizes are receiving directly from the American Rescue Plan Act, some of the discretionary funding streams from the, infrastructure investment and jobs act using those streams to ensure a just equitable and transformative recovery. And I also have to say that this program wouldn't be a sliver of what it is without Toni's, brilliant mind and energy. She's really the the glue for this program.

C Yeah. But so for our second cohort, we asked mayors to send us an expression of interest, in participating in in the program, detailing some of the justice oriented initiatives that they already have, where their blind spots are, the kinds of things that they wanted to know more about to go deeper into these priorities that they've already identified as an administration. And we had, tremendous interest in the program, and mayor Day here was one of our selected mayors.

B So mayor Day, we know your leadership path led you to become elected in 2015. Maybe you can tell us a little bit about your leadership journey and then tell us about how you became interested in this program.

D Yeah. Sure. So going back to 2,005, and this is, you know, the experience of serving in either the national president or vice president role in the American Institute of Architecture Students. I reflect on that by saying it ruins you for your career. Your first job is as the CEO or chief operating officer, treasurer, and secretary of a fairly small nonprofit, but a powerful advocacy organization that has traditionally maintained a level of respect among the peer institutions in the profession. And that's your first experience. And your next job is usually go be an intern somewhere, and and that's quite a disruption to the the ego that you've built, or that has been foisted upon you in the days that you occupy that temporarily occupy that role. But others others carve a new path, and Trinity figured out what her path was gonna be before I figured out mine.

D And so the result of that was hastily, she got the 2nd best job in the world, the best job being the job she has now, which is this job where you get to work with mayors, you get to you don't have to be 1, but you get to be in charge of them. You come up with cool programs. You get to engage in in meaningful issues that that delve into the challenges that cities across America are are facing. It's one of the most amazing programs, and at Meriden Institute on City Design in general, that exist in our country. And I think if there was something the only thing that I could think of that would speak to my kind of soul more than just MICD is this Just City Fellowship that that she created. So we'll get to that in a second. But back to that journey, I I literally felt like I don't know what to do with myself. I don't know what I want to do.

D So I briefly went back to the University of Maryland, designed some MBA, master's city planning, and master of architecture, hybrid 3 year program that the school let me design. I was so unhappy. I hated it. And within a few weeks, I had applied to other grad schools and eventually moved on and got a master of urban design at Carnegie Mellon the following. That was my next, degree. And then I continued to avoid the real world for a while with a degree at Oxford University and eventually came back to my hometown and my home region here on the Eastern Shore of Maryland and got involved in various ways, developed a small nonprofit called the Center For Towns as a subsidiary of a land conservation organization, and helped towns with community planning processes in the Eastern Shore region. But I drove home every night, read the newspaper, and was so embarrassed by what was going on in my city that I decided ultimately to get involved and to run for elected office, first as the city council president, later as mayor. I often say that the the only job I ever aspire to now is governor of Delmarva.

D And since that's a make believe job and a state that doesn't exist, I think the other job I aspire to do is Trinity's. And since nobody's ever gonna unseat her, I'll just take as, consolation prize the ability to get to work with her again from time to time, which I've gotten to do twice through, Regional Mayors Institute classes and now as a member of the Just City Merrill Fellowship. It speaks to, I think, the best part of what we can do as mayors, which is we can not only design a better city, but we can design a better city for all. And that notion of justice, not just equity, which is something that we aspire to hear, but also writing injustices of the past that are anchored not only in memory, but in institutions and in structures and in asphalt and concrete and mistakes and planning mistakes and construction mistakes. We can do better than that. And I think that's what I aspire or what that's what inspired me to apply. Also, again, the opportunity to work with with Trinity. But what I've found in the first few, weeks month of this program is that the best imaginable curriculum if I could go back to grad school full time and do it like this, it's what I would do.

D The speakers that have been gathered around are amazing, and I really feel like I've been asked to reenter the architecture school environment. So I've got my I've got my MICD notebook and my sketchbook I'm constantly doodling in. I also get to bring 2 staff members. So each of the 8 mayors has brought 2 staff members, and I've got my city administrator, who's my, number 2, my chief operating officer here, and our director of housing and community development, the space in which we want to have an impact with our next project or with our our project. So I get to bring other people along, and we get to share and get excited about not only the ideas that we have for our community, but the concepts and and the impact that maybe these seeds can have on American justice through the city. So it's an exciting time, and it's exciting program and, really, one of the most powerful things that I've got to participate in my 7 or so years as mayor.

B I do wanna touch on maybe what drove you to run for public office because I feel like I I know there's a deeper story there. I know you were working in a nonprofit organization, and you're designing interventions at the urban scale for your town. But then what was it that drove you into seeking public office?

D Yeah. So there's ingredients that you have to mix together here to get the full story, I think. The first piece is and we've gotta be transparent about it. I've gotta be transparent about it, at least. When I was 7 years old, stating to my parents at the time, I'm gonna be mayor one day. I wanna be mayor. And I didn't know what that meant. Maybe the mayor came to the school and talked to us about it, the if I were mayor essay contest that the municipal league has.

D I don't know. But there there is that seed, I think, of a desire to serve, and we've all got it. Each of the each of you has it. That's probably not all you need to jump to leap out there into running for office. You have to also be completely blind to how the ignorant, to how awful it can be. But the and the 3 of you are probably smarter than that. I was not. But the other piece or the second piece is, I think, being inspired by those who had come before.

D And when I served when I was in the role president of AIS, I also served as the national student director on the AIA board of directors. The leaders that I interacted with there, including mayor Jeremy Harris from Honolulu, who was one of the public directors on the board. I I learned so much, and it it was actually Jeremy at a dinner at, I think it was convention in Vegas in 2005. We were sitting at a table with him. I asked him, hey. How would you propose those of us who are young and interested in service? What would what should we do? And he said, go back to your hometown. And he said, don't be mayor of Washington DC or, you know, New York or you need to go back to Salisbury. That's what you care about.

D So that that seed also probably contributed. And then, lastly, I think it was coming back to to my town and seeing leaders that were so frequently focused not on substance, did this, and pointing the finger. That was just, again, not a style, but or did this, and pointing the finger. That was just, again, not a style of leadership that or of even just carrying oneself in a public realm that I was used to. I was used to these these leaders in the profession, in our profession, frankly, who were aspiring to higher ideals and talking about what our cities could be, and, you you know, I didn't find that when I came home. I I think some of that played a role too in ultimately making me realize that I had to consider a candidacy and had to consider stepping out there on my own.

A Trinity, you mentioned just going back into the overview of the mayor institute on city design that did you say? You said mayors are the city's urban designers or urban planners. I can't remember what the exact terminology is.

C We we, we say that mayors are their city's chief urban designer.

A So mayors are the city's chief urban designer. So this question is for both of you. So, Jake, as a mayor, how have you been able to take that kind of title that MICD has been placed on and create change? And then, Trinity, I don't know if you can do other examples of maybe other mayors that have really left one of your sessions and adopted that title and seen implementation at the community level?

D What I'd say is so this past week, I spent time with the godfather of chief urban designers, mayor Riley of Charleston, South Carolina, who served for over 40 years as his mayor. And I think what's really most fascinating about what Trinity does is, you know, the the program is not for mayors with a master's degree in urban design. It's for all mayors. And Joe Riley doesn't have a degree in urban design, I don't think, and, is not an architect. So, you know, what he but what he realized and when he gave a keynote speech last week in to other mayors, South Carolina mayors, what he focused on was it was detail. It was it was design. Yeah. It was big plans and big ideas and big projects, but he cared about how the gravel felt under his feet at the, Trinity, you've probably seen this talk, at the waterfront park that they were building.

D So I think the fact that you can go through these sessions and gain an appreciation for the details in your city and and the way you ought to care about it as the leader, that's what's powerful about the program. I think you can transform people into urban designers and into that chief urban designer. The reason I laughed, Evelyn, as you're asking that question, is I also just laughed, left a staff meeting where design details came up. We talked about paint on Tiny Home Village that we're building. We talked about the fit out of a community center we we're building. We talked about whether or not the alter or equivalent, excuse me, on street furniture was gonna be acceptable and where I ultimately had to say no. None of these are close enough, and we're not gonna accept that. So sometimes it frustrates, I think, our team when we're the chief urban designer of our city, but it's so important.

D And that's why I think, again, what Trinity does and what that program does is so impactful for mayors across the country.

C Yeah. And and thanks, mayor Dave, for for bringing up mayor Riley too because I should have started the introduction with the mayor's institute with the fact that the mayor's institute was the brainchild of of mayor Joe Riley. So mayor Riley was was mayor of Charleston until 2015 or 2016, but had served for 40 years and and came up with the idea back in in 1986. So he is our dean of of design as well at the mayor's institute. There are a bunch of different ways to answer the the macro question about the impact of the institute and what happens when you have 1200 mayors that have been trained in urban planning, urban design 101, let's say. And we see a number of things that we call success. Right? Like, it's actually pretty rare that the project that the mayor brings to the institute gets completed to a level of design excellence, you know, check, check, check, check, check. The reality is that mayors often bring us pretty thorny projects.

C They bring us projects that are stalled for any number of reasons. And, they actually often bring us projects that, you know, they kinda know what to do, and they need some bolstering on doing the right thing and getting over hurdles. We think that we're giving mayors the tools to look at individual projects on a kind of project basis and make good decisions, but we're also teaching them how to be problem solvers and how to problem solve like architects and designers do. More often than not, when we run into mayors at mayor meetings, they say, oh, my project is stalled, but I did this and this based on what I learned at the institute. And it could be a housing program. It could be a workforce. It could be a policy. Like, it doesn't even necessarily have to be the built environment, but they came to see their role through this experience at the institute as the kind of master convener, as the generalist in the room, as the one who doesn't get overruled by the specialists.

C And so there's any number of successes that that we say that we have at the Institute and the kind of footprint that the Institute has had on American cities in in ways large and small.

D Can I can I just add something? Trinity's description there of the types of projects that mayors bring and where those projects go hit really close to home in each of those descriptions. And and as she or as I think I shared, I've gone to 2 sessions as a mayor. The first, there's been so much progress on this project and, you know, I didn't know the best answer. It was really a project where there were multiple answers, maybe. How to bridge a connection between our city park, which is this gem, and our downtown, which is where most of our revitalization efforts are focused. And they're divided by a a 5 lane highway, which is 6 feet higher than the Riverwalk in downtown, and then a a railroad trestle, which is a major sloped embankment, steep embankment, and is another 13 or 14 feet higher than that. So it's this massive structural divide, and the connection out of that process was, hey. You need to make multiple connections through trails, and you need to connect at the at grade crossings you have, which are just a 100 feet this way or or 200 feet that way, and and just capitalize on those.

D And we've now fully funded and, built out portions of that, and we have a major piece, a reduction of impervious surface and expansion of our our greenway into a street, and that was all a recommendation from that project or that process that is all getting ready to be constructed this spring summer. So we're super excited about that. And then the other project, which was a neighborhood disconnected from the water, we've built out a a major bikeway along one street there, but the the neighborhood is it is a thorny issue. It's this still tough we we were all of these questions were raised about who lives there, and we learned more through those questions about who lives there and just how transient the neighborhood is and how disconnected they feel from the water, and we haven't figured it out. We don't know exactly where to go next, and we're still struggling. And so, those are 2, maybe, extremes, but it's everything in between too. And the Mayor's Institute does give you access to brilliant people, not just the technical team, but also the other mayors that you're around. And I learned so much from them, also developed relationships that will last for, hopefully, a lifetime with some of those other mayors.

D So I'm really grateful for what that's created, not just in answers for my community, but in in terms of answering tough questions that will come in the future.

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D In ways that, again, frustrate the staff sometimes? I got a great team. I got I look. I'm going through the season of if I were a mayor right now, where 4th graders across the state of Maryland have us have mayors into their classrooms virtually, mostly now, but also some in person, and where we they write an essay, what they would do if they were mayor. It's also an opportunity to open to questions, and we always do. And one of the questions that you get every time is, what's it like to be the mayor? And I could write 10 books, and it's tough to summarize. But I will tell you that every day is different, and you do have to rapidly jump from topic to topic. You don't always have to be an expert on each topic. Obviously, you lean on subject matter experts, but I think you have to have a pretty clear vision of where you intend to go with that topic.

D And for me, it's it's a process of always communicating at least 2 things, but usually there's more than that. Usually there's a couple more, and I'll mention them to to my team, and that is purpose and end state. And on every task, on every project, I make sure that every everyone on our team understands the why. And so we use we use a project management software, not unlike many companies do. For ours, every task, not just every project, but every task has an articulated, typed out, written purpose statement with it. And so everyone knows why we're doing that, and sometimes it probably feels really repetitive and they get sick of hearing it. And why does that pothole need to get filled? Because our infrastructure has to be maintained in good working condition. Why must the property maintenance code be enforced on that house that's falling into disrepair? Because we ought to have a beautiful city.

D And they probably get tired of reading that sentence. It's the purpose and that's the why, and they've gotta know that. And it's not just about because the mayor saw it and it's not just about a citizen complained. It's about what's the deeper reason why we do those things and why we fund a staff associated with that task. And then the second is end state. Too often in bureaucracies, we become oriented on the process and explaining process. So in staff meetings, I one of the things that we have developed here is I have no interest in hearing your process and your challenges and what hiccup you ran into or what I I we can talk about that in 1 on ones. So we have 1 on 1 meetings, and you can vent there, and we could talk about it, and you could tell me why this is such a a burdensome project.

D But in staff meetings, which ought to be collaborative, team driven, you're going to talk about your progress toward end state. Are you getting there? And so we also clearly articulate the end state in every one of those tasks, which is it's not enough to work on it. I appreciate that you have shown up for 40 hours last week. I appreciate that you did a job. But what I want to know is, did you understand that and let's use a simple example. That pothole being filled was the reason why it was tasked yet, not, you know, oh, you know, the team is working on acquiring additional hot mix to fill that pot. I don't care. Fill the pot hole.

D Purpose and end state help us, I think, keep focused and certainly help me communicate what a a mayor should or what a a leader or an executive should to to the organization. So that's a long way of saying that those things probably frustrate the team from time to time, but it's also, I think, how we've been able to get a lot done in a short period of time. We pride ourselves on trying to change at the pace that society changes, and, obviously, we're we're gonna fall short of that many times, and we're understanding when we do. I'm understanding when we do. But the notion that government operates slow and that's okay is not acceptable to me. We've gotta act fast because people will accept change, I think. I think we've proven that people are comfortable with a rapid pace of change so long as it has a meaningful impact on their lives, and that's not something that government has traditionally embraced as a mantra.

A For those who are really interested in understanding and using a vocabulary that talks about what skills did I learn as an architect that directly translate into what I'm doing beyond I think we always say architects are problem solvers. What does that really mean? Like, what is that skill that architects have or that that architectural training had that you use in in each of your roles and as problem solvers, as design thinkers. Can you maybe help us go a little bit deeper on kind of these bigger notions?

D Yeah. Yeah. Trinity has seen way more mayors, so she probably knows examples of where it's been done better. But the thing I can say is that to answer the first question, the last question, simply, it's mayors get stuff done. And that's the obligation and that's the difference between us and higher levels of government, is that we have to show concrete accomplishment quickly at the ground level, and it's not that difficult. But I think from a design education background or design background standpoint, what I see constantly confronted with people in between complaints about that darn traffic circle isn't gonna work and things like that, and my trash didn't get picked up. In between those things, I am confronted with people. How do you how'd you get all that stuff done? I've lived here for 30 I mean, to our credit, yes, that's nice to hear, but I'm also reminded every time I hear it that there's nothing magic in me or what we do.

D It's really about the the thing I would credit to my design background or education is it's really about very easily being able to go from, again, end state, the vision, the thing I want to see done, to, okay, what's my first step? What's my second step? What's my third step? Whether that's the design process or building a model, you all have had a vision in your head of what that model's gonna look like once it's on the table in front of that design jury. And at some point, you gotta go buy the the cardboard. It's not like that anymore. You gotta plug it into the laser cut. But you gotta go buy the chipboard. You gotta go buy the amount of glue you need. You gotta buy the number of X Acto knives you're gonna need and start assembling. We know how to do that because we did it, and that's where we began and that's what we've been trained in.

D And I think that has benefited me much more than many high ideals of design process.

C Yeah. I think I wanna answer this in in 2 different directions. So the first, is expanding on mayor Day's really beautiful answer about the day to day and how you're prioritizing vision in every single thing that you do, which is remarkable. That's often not mayors, leaders keep vision front and center, and I think it's the the difference between a good mayor and a great mayor. And that that also, I feel, is a kind of direct outcome of architecture education, of how you problem solve, but how you ask questions, how you redefine questions, and how you're outcome centered. And the second way I wanna answer this is actually pragmatic and less about school and more about architects, because I was on a panel not long ago with Tom Hurlburt, who's a city council an architect and a city council member in Sioux Falls. And he had this incredible slide that was, like, what a city council does and coincidentally what an architect does also. And so with permission, I altered that slide to say what a mayor does, and I use that slide often now with with credit to him.

C But I've said, many times that architects or designers and mayors are natural bedfellows. And I think that mayors often see that and designers often see that as a kind of conclusion of an institute. But his slide, it's great. It's like, manages multimillion dollar projects, envisions future development and growth, participates in planning and zoning issues, understands and develops city ordinances, understands public private partnerships, understands and participates in the public RFP process, dreams big, listens to clients and constituents, and just laid that out in a really pragmatic and clear way that I think is also compelling to people in private practice who are traditional architects to say that I don't necessarily have to be in an alternate career to find my place in my local community.

B Trinity, you have set this up to talk a lot about what you're training the mayors to do. I'm also curious about what skills are transferring into your role as an executive director because mayor Day has said that he feels like he's gone back to architecture school a little bit with your curriculum. I'm curious what skills show up in your work, and then also what are you teaching others that are coming to participate in this program? What is your vision for the role that architects and designers can play in shaping, communities with mayors?

C I've alluded to it a a few times, but this sense of redefine questions and thoroughly understand a problem before they come up with a solution to the the problem, in a kind of overly simplified way of describing it. And that in particular is a skill that that we use every single day, but particularly during the pandemic. Because before it was like, we tried to dive deep into the institute sessions and how we could individually make those better. But to be to have to completely flip all of our programming into a virtual environment, how you deliver how you deliver knowledge and information that is needed to mayors who have, you know, no time, no capacity, and a 1000000 fires to put out even more than normal. You have to take a step back and ask, what's the question? What's the problem? What's the need? And that changed so many times during the pandemic that we were constantly creating and throwing new programs at the wall, but we did that with the basis of what's the capacity right now, what what's the primary need right now, how can we plug in a hyper specific way and be helpful, And then how you're always taking stock of what you're learning, what is transferable to the next thing, but also to to whenever we go back to in person programming. I think that's maybe one example of you've got a paradigm here. And as that shifts, how you approach, how you resolve it, I I still maintain is is a a skill set that's relatively unique to the design professions.

A No. I think a lot of it actually goes to implementation. Right? Seeing the vision and understanding all the steps to implement even if it is Trinity, like, the shift. And I would hope that architects using their creative mindset are actually bringing greater shifts in a positive way to to their communities as well. But speaking of shifts and and pivots, you know, this this is not a linear path for you all, and you have talked a little bit about how the way that you found yourself here. I'm happy to dive deeper in the kind of what were the pivots that you took away. But I think a secondary question that I wanna ask is, how can you help those that are also considering a shift, and what are the questions that they should be asking themselves right now that you wish you would have asked of yourself sooner?

D Just for me, I know I spent a lot of time even just filling notebooks with thoughts about the impact I wanted to have on the world. I think we there there was a point in time while I was at AIAS and and maybe in grad school after that, where I was often trying to decide just how wide or how deep I wanted to be in my career. And I saw I saw people, going in really deep into becoming real experts at subsets of design, whether it was in sustainability or whether it was in transportation or they were going pretty deep. And I don't know I don't know if there was a point in time where I made a choice, a deliberate choice, but there were definitely forks in the road where choices were made. And one of those forks, when I came to Salisbury and took a job with what was then that parent company I mentioned earlier, the Eastern Shore Land Conservancy, is a land conservation organization. I'm an architect and an urban designer. Their job is to stop things from being built. My job is to design the things that are being built.

D And that's putting it pretty simply, but there was a big gap there philosophically, potentially. And the other job I was considering at the time was a fellowship at the World Bank, and they couldn't be more different. I knew I was interested in policy and the environment, but the those forks of the road, I think, present real early in your career, especially, these real challenges of what am I gonna be, what am I gonna do, what's my contribution gonna be. If I go down this road, will it be meaningful, will it be impactful, will I be happy? And I think I made the right choice, but who knows? What I do know is those things that I took with me that were part of my DNA in terms of design and and a love for the built environment and what it can do and what it can be, that eventually became the town's program, a change to the strategy of that land conservancy and appreciation for good development. Now they're a developer. They're a that that organization, that nonprofit is a developer. They have built 2 of the most exciting things to happen on the Eastern Shore Maryland, one of which is under construction and in partnership with another major developer. And these are right in the center, right in the heart of small cities, on the Eastern Shore in my region.

D And their DNA changed. We fused. We merged. That's maybe what I'd say to people is think about what impact you can have on the world and the structures that do exist. Because you're not entering we're not entering on a blank canvas. We're birthed into the world out of architecture score, design score, wherever, into a very messy environment. And the question is not what can you create on that blank canvas? It's, how can you shift the world, and what part of the world do you wanna shift? I I think it's a matter of introspection and reflection and what do I bring to the table? Because the truth is I was never gonna be the best architect. I was never gonna be the the sustainability expert.

D I didn't have it in me, and and I was never going to be a a great, structural designer. I I almost failed physics class. There there were all these things that other architecture students, my peers, were doing and could do that I couldn't do. And so you gotta be introspective and think, what do I bring to the fight, and how am I gonna shape the world as a result? And so it's a kinda this beautiful marrying you have to find of the insertion point, the skills you bring, what the world needs, and how it can all be meaningful to you.

C Yeah. I think that's great. My kind of pivot was centered around a very specific question, and it may have may have come from the the substantial amount travel I did during my AIS vice presidency, but the kind of question was, like, if we have all of these really great architects out there, and I think back to my classmates at Arkansas, and they're really talented, like, all of them, then why do we have, like, why are there so many really ugly places in our cities? And why aren't our cities more lovable other than a little piece of it, hopefully? What was the missing link there? And so that led me to urban planning school where, like, I learned how urban planners have also failed to do this. And so this question, like, persisted. How could this be better? Of course, the answer is that there's, like, a lot of people in our cities that are trying to make things better every day. But in my mind, I don't understand how architects or designers can't be asking themselves those questions every day. For me, it led to an interest a particular interest in local government where how local government can shape lives. Mayors get stuff done.

C It was very compelling to to continue to work with mayors after I had started that path early in my career. And that was it for me, but I feel like the there's so many different insertion points that people in the design professions can have to quite simply make our cities better.

B I I think that ties into my earlier question of I wanna hear from your words, like, what role can architects and designers play in shaping our communities? What because my frustration was always about the lack of leadership there. I'm curious for you. What vision do you have for them?

C You can run for office like mayor Day here. I actually have I have a a lot of thoughts on this, and then I would also love to hear from from the mayor your kind of perspective in local elected leadership, how you feel your local design community can better be of service. But I think so many as I alluded to, so many of our policies and programs are created, like, without an eye towards unintended consequences, and architects have a unique ability to plug in there. I think so just a a kind of example, parking minimums. Right? So we all know we all know parking minimums. In theory, they exist to, you know, make sure a business has has enough parking. But doesn't a business already have a good sense of how much parking they need, especially if they're served by transit or a walk shed? And what are the unintended consequences of that? So it's buildings sitting vacant or underutilized in, like, denser areas of our cities because you can't find, like, 40 parking spaces for a restaurant, even if the space is perfect. But my college town of Fayetteville, Arkansas was one of the first in the US to end parking minimums citywide.

C Did this in 2015. This was an effort that happened to be spearheaded by a planner design professional that turned city councilman. But what happened? Downtown and other areas are flourishing. Buildings that hadn't been occupied for decades are back. They figured out the parking. There's shared parking agreements, fewer spaces than the code previously called for. And these fears of, like, street parking being impossible to find in neighborhoods that are nearby just didn't materialize. But it took someone with a broader view of equity and mobility and development who told me one time about him serving on the Boston Redevelopment Authority.

C And he said during his entire time there at public meetings that an architect never once came out in support of a project, only in opposition. Like, most people come. But how can we use our voices to promote development that we want in a city? And then finally using that voice, the mayor once told me, that while he was running for office, there was a local landscape architect that would frequently contribute to the local paper. So she was writing mostly in support of a highway removal project, which we, you know, we know are contentious and expensive. And before these articles, he said his only real view on this was purely a financial lens. And then as he's reading her articles, he came to see it as a a quality of life issue, an environmental issue. And so he reached out to her, and she became, like, one of his closest advisors during his time as mayor. So I I just feel like there are so many ways that you can maintain your practice and work to better your community at the same time.

C So, mayor Day, I'd love to hear how you feel your your local design community gives service.

D Trinity, I think those are great examples of of how impactful the voice of designers can be. And it's got me thinking about when do I hear the voice of designers here. And one of the reasons I'll answer that question by saying one of the reasons why I was attracted to local government, mayor being in this position is that I could drive decisions that would eventually become design projects and eventually become the design changes that I wanted to see in my community. It's one of the reasons that at one point in my career, I thought I was interested in real estate development too. Getting closer to the decision point. Right? The point at which a decision is made or where tough decisions are made. Because what I often find in my community is that my engagement with architects, landscape architects, designers is at the point at which a project has already been developed. There is, financing.

D There is a developer. There is a a property owner. All those things are already calculated by that point, and that's what I'm hearing from architects. They care about it. They've got skin in the game. They've got a client. I I wish I was hearing from them when there was no project and saying, this is what we need, mayor. This is where you can make a major impact or an improvement.

D And there are those designers in my community who do speak that way, and they stand out. They stand out as the people who whenever a big hairy question comes into play, that's who I wanna reach out to because they're already proposing solutions out there into the world. Even if there is no client and there is no funding stream, those things can materialize once there's a good idea. A good enough idea will garner all those things to help make it a reality. And I think architects could be the advocates for those great ideas that that are not of themselves a funded project yet.

C I think people underestimate the their ability to call up the mayor's office and meet with someone. May not be the mayor on the first meeting.

D Some do. Some do. Others think you should be there and available at all times anytime they want. And they're, you know, pissed off.

C If you show up with, with good helpful ideas

D You're right. You're right.

A I think

C they underestimate that access.

A So this is a conversation that I would love to keep going. I was joking, Jake, before you got on with Trinity and Janine that the only connection that I have with you these days is literally through your Instagram account.

D That's alright.

A So I almost wanna, like, capture this and continue the conversation because it's been so long. But as a way to kinda transition and close out at least this episode on practice disrupted, And you guys have answered this question, I think, in so many number of different ways. So I'm trying to figure out what is this particular spin for this episode. We always ask our our guests the closing question. What is one main idea or lesson on change needed in the practice of architecture that you'd like to pass forward to architects, emerging professionals, and industry disruptors listening?

C So one idea I I think I'm actually gonna take a different stance on that than my answer of the ways that people can show up, which is to say that architects can listen humbly, and architects can bring their skills to community change and can indeed be leaders in this, but only once they have the full picture. And political tensions, communities that have been left behind, like, how do we use our skills to elevate those voices? Even if you're looking at this through the lens of private practice where folks might say, that's not my responsibility, how do you ensure that your projects continue to contribute to equity and justice and accessibility and don't further exasperate those disparities. And if it's not, who do you insist is on your team to do that? I always say that architects have a responsibility to more than their client, but in order to fully harness that, I think architects need to show up in their communities first as listeners. Yeah.

D That's that's a great point. And one that maybe was missed as we're talking about how impactful architects can be, that humility is still important entering into any community. I guess what I'd say is just a word of of advice on on the impact that an emerging professional or young professional can have in kind of crafting where they go and what change, they can make is that some of the most interesting and inspiring urban practice, and there's really not a a field or profession that I can think of, but I've seen them in the forms of community organizations, nonprofits, for profit enterprises. But those institutions that have a theoretical and broad objective but anchor it in place are are some of the most meaningful endeavors that I've witnessed and can ripple incredibly far. So what I'd say to those designers out there, those young designers, is anchor your practice in place. Find somewhere that means something to you and go do it. Go start producing because even if it takes years to come to fruition or a few years to produce some evidence, that can be so impactful. And the example I'm thinking of is not necessarily a design practice, although some of the some of them were classmates or the class ahead of me at Carnegie Mellon Urban Design Program.

D They created a company called Gtech Strategies, and Gtech Strategies in Pittsburgh, they went into communities and built an urban agriculture company, not a not just a community practice, but a for profit enterprise that was oriented not only on the reclamation of vacant property, but phytoremediating plants, and then ultimately a business practice that created jobs in the neighborhood through the sale of the oil that came from the Brassica plants that were planted. I mean, there was a lot of design that went into it because there was some designers, that were involved. There were also some business students involved. So finding a spot that's meaningful to you, not all of them were from Pittsburgh, but they've stayed there. They've since gone on to do interesting things. Any way that you can demonstrate that impact on place is going to inspire others in other communities to to learn from what you've done, to see what you've done, and to do it for themselves. That'd be my advice. My advice would be find that spot that's meaningful.

D Anchor it in place, demonstrate demonstrate that great idea, put theory into practice.

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