120 Radically Wonderful Proposals - the Mob Decides
Six presenters hold placards describing proposals below, they briefly harangue the audience, then guide them to vote YES, NO, or MAYBE. Ridiculous proposals are inserted throughout. Scheduled for Berkeley Main Public Library October 17, 2-4pm (pending), and Sports Basement, 2727 Milvia, November 21, 2-4pm.
ORGANIZED BY:
James Martell PhD - political science professor at San Francisco State University, co-editor of How not to be Governed: Readings and Interpretations from a Critical Anarchist Left
Phoenix Armenta - Environmental Justice & Community Engagement Specialist, Governor’s Office of Land Use & Climate Management
Raines Cohen - Northern California Regional Organizer with Co-Housing California, fostering green intentional neighborhoods (eco-villages) throughout the state.
Hank Pellissier - founder/director of Humanist Mutual Aid Network and The Utopia Team, author of Share The World.
Below the initial list is a duplicate list that reveals all the cities where these reforms are already taking place.
————————————————————————————————————————————
Food & Agriculture
Free community cafeterias
Meatless Mondays or MWF? etc
Free breakfast, lunch, and dinner for all students
Community food gardens mandated on vacant lots
"Edible Berkeley" — food forest: fruit and nut trees in public spaces
Free food markets distribute surplus food
Universal basic food allowance (monthly credit)
City-Run Grocery stores at or near cost
Ban destruction of edible surplus — mandatory donation to Food Not Bombs or similar organizations
Ban fast food within a half-mile of schools
Housing
Housing as a legal, enforceable, human right, enforceable
Squatters' rights for long-vacant buildings
Ban corporate ownership of single-family homes
Publicly-owned housing at low or no rent
Community Land Trusts / take land permanently out of speculation
Cooperative housing requirement for large new developments
Convert vacant commercial buildings into housing
Free/publicly funded ADU (backyard unit) program
"Right to Build" — minimal-bureaucracy small home construction
Cap on how many properties one landlord can own
Public ownership of all vacant land
Neighborhood Housing Assemblies — residents directly decide local housing needs
Transportation
Free public transportation
Car-free downtown Berkeley
One day per week without cars citywide
Free bike-share and e-bike program
Bike lanes citywide
Community car-sharing cooperatives
City-owned rideshare service (public alternative to Uber/Lyft)
Convert a traffic lane on major streets into public space
Gradual replacement of private cars with shared electric transport
Economics & Wealth
Wealth tax on fortunes over $10 million
Universal Basic Income
Maximum wage ratio — 10x lowest-paid worker or 5x or ?
Shorter workweek — 32 hours (4-day week) or 20 hours? or ?
Publicly owned municipal bank
Baby bonds — city-funded trust for every child born
Land value tax replaces property tax
Vacant home tax
Time banking (one hour of labor = one hour of anyone else's)
Local/community currency
Reparations fund financed by local wealth tax
Free childcare for all families
Labor
Guaranteed minimum hours for gig workers
Portable benefits system independent of employer
Right to strike protections extended to gig workers
City-funded sabbaticals every 7 years for long-term residents
"Right to Disconnect" — no work email after hours, legally enforced
Technology & Communication
Free municipal internet / public ownership of broadband
Ban targeted or private advertising in public space
Free community tool libraries and repair shops
“No-Electronics” in selected public areas
Health
Free universal health care, plus dental and vision care
A Cuban doctor on every residential block
Safe injection sites with on-site treatment access
Free doulas and postpartum care
City-run pharmacy selling at cost
Dogs pee in parks, why can’t we? Decriminalize public urination.
Environment & Ecology
Ban new fossil fuel infrastructure
Mandatory/publicly funded solar on all suitable roofs
Neighborhood microgrids
Free home weatherization
Turn parking lots into parks
Rewild portions of public land
Zero-waste Berkeley
Ban gas-powered leaf blowers and lawn equipment
One new tree planted per resident
Daylight buried creeks
Free composting and rainwater harvesting kits
Per-resident carbon budget, taxed if exceeded
Make Berkeley a carbon-negative city
Guarantee every resident public/green space within a 5-minute walk
Democracy & Governance
Neighborhood assemblies with real, binding local authority
Citizens' assemblies chosen by lottery with legislative power
Ranked-choice voting for local elections
Recall elections via petition with a low signature threshold
Lower local voting age to 16
Participatory budgeting — 25% of the budget to the entire budget
Participatory city planning — residents co-design major developments
Public ownership of essential utilities
"Open-Book Government" — full, real-time access to city finances
Neighborhood veto power over developments that violate local plans
"Berkeley Commons Council" — oversees community land, gardens, and commons
Education & Culture
Free public college / trade school for residents
Free musical instrument lending library
Universal library card granting access to tools, equipment, and skills classes
City-funded artist stipends
Animal Rights
Ban all animal agriculture within city limits
Mandatory vegan option at city-funded events and institutions
Ban fur, leather, and wool sales citywide
Ban animal testing by companies headquartered in the city
No-kill mandate for animal control, unlimited shelter funding
Mandatory wildlife corridors through new development
"Right-to-rescue" law for animals in visible distress
Non-lethal pest control ordinances
10 Puppy Cafes
No Pet Stores, No Selling Animals (they can only be “adopted”)
Bioregional
Redraw governance boundaries around the watershed, not city lines
"Rights of nature" charter — creek, bay, and hills granted legal standing
Daylight buried creeks
Native plant mandate replacing non-native public landscaping
Foodshed self-sufficiency target — 20% of food sourced within the bioregion
Bioregional currency usable only within the watershed
Full ecological rewilding of a percentage of public parks
Align city meetings and school holiday calendar with local ecological seasons
Mandatory permeable materials — ban new impervious surfaces like concrete
Reintroduce locally extinct species (beavers, salmon)
Bioregional watershed ecology as core school curriculum
Dismantle the sewer system for decentralized greywater/composting systems
Anarchist
Secession from the USA
Abolish Police, replace with community mediation & reparation
Consensus-based neighborhood assemblies with binding authority
Dissolve zoning laws — Neighborhood determination of land use
Abolish landlords — housing stewarded, not owned
Replace Criminal Courts with restorative justice
Abolish politicians, dismantle City Council, replace with rotating citizen delegate governance
Abolish ICE, no cooperation with immigration enforcement
Worker takeover of any closing/relocating business
Abolish money for essentials — food, water, shelter distributed by need
Abolish Prison, redirect funds to housing and mental health
Direct democracy app — any resident proposes/votes on binding ordinances anytime
Random
Kristi Noem is director of Animal Care & Control
Komodo Dragons released into Strawberry Canyon to solve deer overpopulation
Drone Babysitters provided to parents at parks, they tase anyone who approaches without a password
Forced De-Programming Therapy for Zionism Addicts
Sex Robot Brothels in empty Churches
Rename Berkeley to “Huchin”, after the original Ohlone village
Make Telegraph Avenue a Giant Slip-and-Slide Every Sunday Afternoon - Pedestrians Only
Free Therapy Goats — every resident gets two hours of goat-assisted emotional counseling per week.
Municipal Compliment Department — city employees hired to randomly stop residents on the street and praise them.
Public Libraries Also Lend People — check out a stranger for companionship, conversation or philosophical debate.
Mandatory Political Names — everyone newborn must have a name like Zapata, Moonbeam, Guernica
Train Pigeons to Deliver Burritos
Declare Berkeley a Sanctuary City for Political Exiles : welcome dissidents, whistleblowers and persecuted activists from anywhere.
Adopt Gaza as a Sister-City
Free Psilocybin
Adopt Poison Oak as the City Plant
No Berkeley Money for War — prohibit investment in weapons production.
BART is Extended to North Korea as a Goodwill Peace Gesture
Foreign Aid is Distributed Exclusively as Artisanal Sourdough and Fair Trade Coffee
War is Replaced by Betting on the Cal Football “Big Game”
————————-
MASSIVE PRECEDENT LIST
Radical municipal policies that already exist—or have been seriously attempted
Legend
🟢 Implemented — substantially exists somewhere
🟡 Pilot / partial / limited implementation
🔵 Seriously proposed — not merely somebody mentioning it
🔴 No meaningful precedent found
I. FOOD & AGRICULTURE
1. Free community cafeterias
🟢 Brazil — municipal Restaurante Popular programs provide extremely inexpensive or free meals.
🟢 São Paulo — Bom Prato provides subsidized meals through a large network.
🟢 Belo Horizonte — municipal popular restaurants provide inexpensive meals.
🟡 New York City — extensive city-supported free-meal infrastructure.
Berkeley version: free municipal restaurants/cafeterias where anyone can eat.
2. Meatless Mondays
🟢 New York City — Meatless Mondays in public schools.
🟢 Los Angeles — plant-based/Meatless Monday initiatives.
🟢 Washington, D.C. — plant-based initiatives in public institutions.
🟢 Numerous university and municipal systems worldwide.
NYC has gone further, pairing Meatless Mondays with Plant-Powered Fridays in its public schools.
3. Free breakfast, lunch AND dinner for students
🟢 New York City — universal free breakfast and lunch.
🟢 Los Angeles Unified School District — universal free meals.
🟢 Chicago Public Schools — universal free meals.
🟢 Boston Public Schools — universal free school meals.
🟡 Dinner — extensive after-school/free-meal programs exist, but universal breakfast+lunch+dinner is considerably rarer.
My proposal: more radical than the current American model.
4. Community food gardens on vacant lots
🟢 Philadelphia
🟢 Milwaukee
🟢 Detroit
🟢 Chicago
🟢 New York City
🟢 Baltimore
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Cleveland
🟢 Boston
🟢 Oakland
This is one of the easiest proposals to defend as something cities have already done.
5. Public food forests
🟢 Seattle — Beacon Food Forest
🟢 Madison
🟢 Philadelphia
🟢 Baltimore
🟡 Numerous smaller communities
Berkeley proposal: "Edible Berkeley."
This is particularly because it sounds utopian but has a direct precedent.
6. Free food markets
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Berlin
🟢 London
🟢 Paris
🟢 New York
🟢 San Francisco
Usually these involve food rescue rather than the municipality purchasing all the food.
7. Universal basic food allowance
🟡 Stockton, California — unconditional monthly cash.
🟡 Jackson, Mississippi — guaranteed-income experiments.
🟡 Los Angeles — BIG:LEAP guaranteed-income program.
🟡 New York City — various guaranteed-income experiments.
🟡 Barcelona — guaranteed-income experimentation.
The important distinction for your Town Hall: the precedent is unconditional cash, not necessarily a food-restricted allowance.
8. City-run grocery stores
🟢/🟡 New York City — currently being implemented.
This one is especially extraordinary because it is happening right now, rather than being an old historical experiment.
NYC plans five municipal grocery stores, one in each borough. The city has committed $70 million, and its stated goal is to make a core basket of groceries 30% cheaper than typical retail prices. The first store is expected in 2027.
So my Berkeley proposal can literally say:
CITY-OWNED GROCERY STORES — NYC, 2026
9. Mandatory donation of edible surplus
🟢 France — major supermarkets are required to redistribute edible food rather than destroy it.
🟢 Italy — food-waste legislation encourages redistribution.
🟢 Paris
🟢 Milan
🟢 Numerous European municipalities
10. Ban fast food near schools
🟢 Various jurisdictions internationally
🟡 London — restrictions on new fast-food outlets around schools have been pursued.
🟡 Los Angeles — zoning restrictions on fast-food establishments have been implemented in particular areas.
🔵 Numerous cities have proposed distance-based restrictions.
II. HOUSING
This is second-biggest source of precedents after transportation.
11. Housing as a human right
🟢 Finland
🟢 Scotland
🟢 France
🟢 Vienna
🟢 Helsinki
The Finnish Housing First system is the most famous example.
12. Squatters' rights
🟢 Netherlands — historically strong squatting rights
🟢 Germany — historical squatter movements
🟢 Spain
🟢 France
🟡 Various U.S. jurisdictions — adverse possession
My version—explicit municipal legalization of occupation of long-vacant buildings—is considerably more radical.
13. Ban corporate ownership of single-family homes
🔵 Several U.S. cities/states have proposed restrictions.
🔵 California
🔵 Minnesota
🔵 New York
🔵 Various municipalities have considered investor-ownership restrictions.
this is "seriously proposed" not "already common."
14. Publicly owned housing
🟢 Vienna
🟢 Singapore
🟢 Helsinki
🟢 Berlin
🟢 Stockholm
🟢 New York City
🟢 London
Vienna is the spectacular example.
15. Community Land Trusts
🟢 Burlington, Vermont
🟢 Boston
🟢 Chicago
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Irvine
🟢 Seattle
🟢 New York City
🟢 Baltimore
🟢 Madison
🟢 Minneapolis
🟢 Los Angeles
This is a huge precedent category.
16. Cooperative housing requirements
🟢 Zurich
🟢 Vienna
🟢 Copenhagen
🟢 Stockholm
🟡 Various German cities
The exact Berkeley formulation—requiring large developments to include cooperatives—is less common, but the underlying concept is extremely well established.
17. Convert vacant commercial buildings into housing
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 New York
🟢 London
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Various California cities
This has become an increasingly important adaptive-reuse policy.
18. Publicly funded ADUs
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 San Jose
🟢 Portland
🟢 Seattle
California has particularly extensive ADU-support programs.
19. Right to Build / simplified small housing
🟢 Houston — famously minimal zoning.
🟢 Portland
🟢 Minneapolis
🟢 California cities
🟡 Tiny-home villages: Seattle, Austin, Portland, Eugene.
20. Landlord property caps
🔵 Various U.S. proposals
🔵 European anti-concentration proposals
🔴 Very few clear municipal implementations.
21. Public ownership of vacant land
🟢 Detroit
🟢 Cleveland
🟢 Baltimore
🟢 Atlanta
🟢 Flint
These cities have used public land banks to acquire and manage vacant properties.
22. Neighborhood housing assemblies
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Porto Alegre
🟢 Montevideo
🟡 Numerous participatory-planning experiments
This is an excellent bridge between my Housing and Democracy sections.
III. TRANSPORTATION
23. FREE PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION
This one has an astonishing number of examples.
🟢 Tallinn, Estonia
🟢 Dunkirk, France
🟢 Hasselt, Belgium
🟢 Luxembourg
🟢 Aubagne, France
🟢 Augsburg, Germany
🟢 Erlangen, Germany
🟢 Akureyri, Iceland
🟢 Keila, Estonia
🟢 Monheim am Rhein, Germany
🟢 Kelheim, Germany
Tallinn currently provides free public transport to registered residents, while Dunkirk is a major example of citywide fare-free transit.
24. Car-free downtown
🟢 Ghent
🟢 Oslo
🟢 Ljubljana
🟢 Pontevedra
🟢 Paris
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Amsterdam
🟢 Copenhagen
🟢 Strasbourg
25. One car-free day per week
🟢 Bogotá — Ciclovía
🟢 Paris
🟢 Jakarta
🟢 Mexico City
🟢 London
🟢 Barcelona
Bogotá's Sunday Ciclovía is probably your most spectacular precedent.
26. Free bike share
🟢 Various European cities
🟡 Subsidized/free systems
🟢 Paris — heavily subsidized Vélib'.
🟢 Numerous university/city systems
27. Citywide bike lanes
🟢 Copenhagen
🟢 Amsterdam
🟢 Utrecht
🟢 Ghent
🟢 Paris
🟢 Bogotá
🟢 Seville
🟢 Montreal
🟢 Portland
28. Community car-sharing
🟢 Zurich
🟢 Berlin
🟢 Amsterdam
🟢 Vancouver
🟢 Montreal
🟢 Portland
29. Public Uber/Lyft alternative
🟢/🟡 Numerous municipal microtransit systems
🟢 Via/municipal partnerships
🟢 Denver
🟢 Arlington, Virginia
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 Numerous rural/municipal demand-responsive transit systems
30. Turn traffic lanes into public space
🟢 Paris
🟢 New York
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Bogotá
🟢 London
IV. ECONOMICS
31. Universal Basic Income
🟡 Stockton
🟡 Los Angeles
🟡 Jackson
🟡 Newark
🟡 Chicago
🟡 Cambridge, Massachusetts
🟡 Barcelona
32. Maximum wage ratio
🔵 Proposed by numerous cooperatives and socialist organizations
🔵 Some public institutions and corporations use internal wage ratios
🔴 Rare as a municipal law.
This is a genuinely radical Berkeley proposal.
33. Four-day workweek
🟡 Numerous governments and municipalities
🟡 Iceland
🟡 Belgium
🟡 UK local-government experiments
🟡 U.S. municipal pilots
34. Public bank
🟢 Bank of North Dakota
🟢 German municipal/public banks
🟢 Sparkassen network
🟡 Los Angeles — public-bank movement
🟡 San Francisco — public-bank efforts
35. Baby bonds
🟢 Washington, D.C.
🟢 Connecticut
🟢 New Jersey
🟢 California proposals/programs
The municipal version is less common.
36. Land-value taxation
🟢 Harrisburg
🟢 Pittsburgh
🟢 Numerous Pennsylvania municipalities
🟢 Australia
🟢 Denmark
🟢 Taiwan
This is a very strong precedent for my list.
37. Vacancy tax
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Vancouver
🟢 Washington, D.C.
🟢 Melbourne
🟢 Paris
38. Time banking
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Bristol
🟢 London
🟢 New York
🟢 Portland
🟢 Ithaca
🟢 Numerous Italian municipalities
39. Local currency
🟢 Bristol Pound
🟢 BerkShares — Massachusetts
🟢 Ithaca Hours
🟢 Brixton Pound
🟢 Chiemgauer — Germany
🟢 WIR — Switzerland
40. Reparations fund
🟢 Evanston, Illinois
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Boston
🟡 Numerous cities
My radical twist is financing reparations through a local wealth tax.
41. Free childcare
🟢 New York City — 3-K/Pre-K
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Berlin
🟢 Paris
🟢 Vienna
🟢 Various Scandinavian municipalities
V. LABOR
42. Gig-worker minimum compensation
🟢 New York City
🟢 Seattle
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 California
43. Portable benefits
🟡 California
🟡 Washington
🟡 Various gig-worker pilots
44. Gig-worker strike protections
🔵 Various legislative proposals
🔴 Very limited municipal implementation.
45. Seven-year sabbatical
🔴 I have not found a strong municipal precedent.
this one is genuinely weird.
46. Right to disconnect
🟢 France
🟢 Spain
🟢 Belgium
🟢 Ireland
🟢 Portugal
🟡 U.S. municipal proposals
VI. TECHNOLOGY
47. Free municipal internet
🟢 Chattanooga
🟢 Longmont
🟢 Wilson
🟢 Lafayette
🟢 Santa Monica
🟢 Ammon
🟢 Burlington
48. Ban advertising in public space
🟢 São Paulo — Clean City Law
🟡 Grenoble
🟡 Various European cities
São Paulo is the spectacular example: it removed thousands of billboards and dramatically restricted outdoor advertising.
49. Tool libraries
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Toronto
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Portland
🟢 Vancouver
🟢 Chicago
50. Device-free public spaces
🟡 Libraries
🟡 schools
🟡 parks/recreation programs
🔴 Very little evidence for citywide legislation.
VII. HEALTH
51. Universal healthcare
🟢 Various national systems
🟢 Cuba
🟢 Canada
🟢 UK
🟢 Nordic countries
🔵 Municipal-only universal healthcare: much harder.
52. "Cuban doctor on every block"
🟢 Cuba — neighborhood family-doctor model.
This is actually an excellent precedent for the concept, although not literally one doctor per block.
53. Safe consumption sites
🟢 Vancouver
🟢 Toronto
🟢 Montreal
🟢 Zurich
🟢 Copenhagen
🟢 Berlin
🟢 Paris
🟢 Lisbon
🟢 Sydney
54. Free doulas
🟢 New York
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Washington, D.C.
🟢 Philadelphia
55. Public pharmacy
🟡 Various public/nonprofit pharmacy models
🟡 Massachusetts
🟡 California proposals
🔵 Municipal pharmacy selling everything at cost: still unusual.
VIII. ENVIRONMENT
56. Ban fossil-fuel infrastructure
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Oakland
🟢 New York
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Vancouver
Oops - Berkeley already does this
57. Mandatory solar
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 Cambridge, Massachusetts
🟢 Various California cities
58. Neighborhood microgrids
🟢 Brooklyn
🟢 San Diego
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Chicago
🟢 Boston
59. Free weatherization
🟢 Chicago
🟢 Boston
🟢 New York
🟢 Seattle
🟢 California programs
60. Parking lots → parks
🟢 Paris
🟢 New York
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Seattle
61. Rewild public land
🟢 London
🟢 Paris
🟢 Berlin
🟢 Amsterdam
🟢 Brussels
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Singapore
62. Zero Waste city
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Capannori, Italy
🟢 Kamikatsu, Japan
🟢 Ljubljana
🟢 Vancouver
🟢 Berkeley
63. Ban gas leaf blowers
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Palo Alto
🟢 Many California municipalities
64. One tree per resident
🟡 Numerous municipal tree campaigns
🟢 Milan
🟢 New York
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 London
🟡 Specific one-tree-per-resident mandates are rarer.
65. Daylight buried creeks
🟢 Seoul — Cheonggyecheon
🟢 Portland
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 Zurich
🟢 Toronto
66. Free compost/rainwater kits
🟢 Portland
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 Austin
🟢 Numerous California cities
67. Five-minute green-space rule
🟢 Paris
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Singapore
🟢 Copenhagen
🟢 Melbourne
The principle—every resident within a short walk of green space—is now a serious urban-planning goal.
IX. DEMOCRACY
My list is extremely well grounded.
68. Neighborhood assemblies
🟢 Porto Alegre
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Madrid
🟢 Paris
🟢 Montevideo
🟢 Buenos Aires
69. Citizens' assemblies selected by lottery
🟢 Brussels
🟢 Paris
🟢 Madrid
🟢 Dublin
🟢 Reykjavik
🟢 Milan
🟢 Melbourne
🟢 Ostbelgien
70. Ranked-choice voting
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 Oakland
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 New York City
🟢 Minneapolis
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Cambridge
🟢 Portland, Maine
🟢 Alaska
71. Low-threshold recalls
🟢 Many U.S. municipalities
🟢 California
🟢 Various Latin American municipalities
72. Voting age 16
🟢 Takoma Park, Maryland
🟢 Berkeley has considered youth voting proposals
🟢 Scotland — some elections
🟢 Austria
🟢 Brazil
🟢 Argentina
73. Participatory budgeting
This is perhaps the single strongest precedent.
🟢 Porto Alegre
🟢 São Paulo
🟢 Buenos Aires
🟢 Rosario
🟢 Paris
🟢 Madrid
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Lisbon
🟢 New York
🟢 Chicago
🟢 Boston
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 Vallejo
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Toronto
🟢 Montreal
🟢 Mexico City
🟢 Montevideo
The global number is hundreds of municipalities and institutions.
Chicago's famous 49th Ward experiment allowed residents to decide how to spend a $1.4 million discretionary budget.
Los Angeles subsequently used participatory budgeting to fund things including rental assistance, anti-eviction programs, street medicine and urban farming.
74. 25% participatory budget
🟢 Paris — particularly strong precedent.
🟡 Other cities have allocated substantial percentages of discretionary/capital budgets.
My proposal to extend this to 25% of the entire municipal budget would be a major escalation.
75. Participatory planning
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 Portland
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Paris
🟢 Berlin
🟢 Amsterdam
76. Public utilities
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Sacramento
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 Cleveland
🟢 Chattanooga
🟢 Munich
77. Open-book government
🟢 Chicago
🟢 New York
🟢 Boston
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Numerous open-data cities
X. EDUCATION & CULTURE
78. Free public college
🟢 New York State
🟢 California community-college programs
🟢 Tennessee
🟢 Germany
🟢 Scotland
79. Free musical instrument libraries
🟢 Toronto
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Chicago
🟢 Various public libraries
80. Library of Things
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 Oakland
🟢 Toronto
🟢 Vancouver
🟢 Seattle
🟢 London
🟢 New York
81. Artist stipends
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 New York
🟢 Berlin
🟢 Paris
🟢 Amsterdam
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 Seattle
XI. ANIMAL RIGHTS
82. Ban fur
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 West Hollywood
🟢 Cambridge
🟢 Ann Arbor
🟢 São Paulo
83. Vegan options in public institutions
🟢 New York
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 Portland
🟢 Numerous European cities
84. Ban animal testing
🔵 Numerous campaigns/proposals
🟡 Restrictions on particular types of testing
🔴 Comprehensive citywide corporate ban is very rare.
85. No-kill animal shelters
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Austin
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 New York
🟢 Riverside
🟢 Numerous U.S. municipalities
86. Wildlife corridors
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 Boulder
🟢 Banff
🟢 Numerous European cities
87. Right to rescue animals
🟡 Various Good Samaritan/rescue laws
🟡 Animal rescue protections
88. Non-lethal pest control
🟢 Various European cities
🟢 Berkeley
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 New York
89. No pet-store animal sales
🟢 Boston
🟢 Cambridge
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 Chicago
🟢 Numerous Massachusetts municipalities
The underlying principle is already widespread: pet shops may be prohibited from selling commercially bred dogs/cats and instead required to work with shelters/rescues.
XII. BIOREGIONALISM
This is where ChatGPT thinks the Town Hall can become really intellectually distinctive.
90. Rights of Nature
🟢 Santa Monica
🟢 Toledo, Ohio
🟢 Pittsburgh
🟢 Ecuadorian municipalities
🟢 New Zealand
🟢 Spain — Mar Menor
91. Watershed governance
🟢 Portland
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Vancouver
🟢 Melbourne
🟢 Brisbane
🟢 London
🟢 Amsterdam
92. Native plant requirements
🟢 Austin
🟢 Tucson
🟢 Portland
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Numerous California jurisdictions
93. Local foodshed targets
🟡 Numerous European food-policy councils
🟡 Toronto
🟡 Vancouver
🟡 Bristol
🟡 Barcelona
94. Local currencies
🟢 Bristol
🟢 Ithaca
🟢 BerkShares
🟢 Brixton
95. Rewilding parks
🟢 London
🟢 Berlin
🟢 Amsterdam
🟢 Brussels
🟢 Paris
96. Ecological education
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Portland
🟢 Vancouver
🟢 Copenhagen
🟢 Melbourne
97. Permeable-surface requirements
🟢 Portland
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Philadelphia
🟢 Berlin
🟢 Numerous California cities
98. Beaver restoration
🟢 England
🟢 Scotland
🟢 Germany
🟢 Netherlands
🟢 Numerous U.S. states
99. Salmon restoration
🟢 Portland
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Vancouver
🟢 Oakland/Bay Area watershed projects
🟢 Pacific Northwest municipalities
100. Decentralized water systems
🟢 Portland
🟢 Seattle
🟢 Various Australian cities
🟡 Greywater systems
🔴 Complete abolition of conventional urban sewer systems: essentially no large-city precedent.
XIII. ANARCHIST / POST-STATE EXPERIMENTS
This is where the ideas are that don't have clean municipal precedents but do have real-world cousins.
101. Police abolition
🟡 Camden, New Jersey — radically reorganized police department.
🟡 Eugene — CAHOOTS
🟡 Denver — STAR
🟡 Oakland — civilian crisis-response proposals
🔵 Minneapolis — abolition/replacement proposal
102. Community mediation replacing police
🟢 Eugene — CAHOOTS
🟢 Denver — STAR
🟢 Numerous restorative-justice programs
103. Restorative justice instead of criminal courts
🟢 New Zealand
🟢 Canada
🟢 Norway
🟢 Various U.S. cities
🟡 Community courts
104. Worker takeover of failing businesses
🟢 Argentina
🟢 Italy
🟢 Spain
🟢 Mondragón, Spain
🟢 Cleveland
🟢 Emilia-Romagna
105. Worker cooperatives
🟢 Mondragón
🟢 Cleveland
🟢 Bologna
🟢 Emilia-Romagna
🟢 Barcelona
🟢 New York
106. Sanctuary city / no immigration cooperation
🟢 San Francisco
🟢 Oakland
🟢 New York
🟢 Chicago
🟢 Los Angeles
🟢 Seattle
107. Direct-democracy digital platform
🟢 Barcelona — Decidim
🟢 Madrid — Decide Madrid
🟢 Reykjavik
🟢 Taipei
This is actually a very strong precedent for your proposed "direct democracy app."
108. Neighborhood veto
🟡 Portland
🟡 Seattle
🟡 Barcelona
🟡 Berlin
🔵 Absolute veto over development: much rarer.
109. Abolish landlords
🔵 Berlin expropriation campaign
🔵 Barcelona housing commons/cooperative movement
🔵 Vienna social housing
🔴 Complete municipal abolition of private landlords: no major-city precedent.
110. Abolish money for essentials
🟢 Free public transit
🟢 Free education
🟢 Free public healthcare
🟢 Free school meals
🟢 Free public water in various systems
🟢 Public housing
So although "abolish money" itself has little municipal precedent, cities already operate many services according to a decommodification principle.
RANDOM IDEAS — AND THEIR REALITY CHECK
Komodo Dragons in Strawberry Canyon🔴
Drone babysitters🔴
Therapy goats🟡 Animal-assisted therapy exists
Human libraries🟢 Real!
Free psilocybin🟡 Decriminalization exists
Political exiles🟡 Historical/modern sanctuary traditions
Gaza sister city🟡 Related sister-city initiatives
Animal-control director as political joke🔴
Giant Telegraph slip-and-slide🟡 Open-streets precedent
Municipal Compliment Department🔴
Pigeon burrito delivery🔴
Political baby names🔴
Poison oak as official plant🔴
BART to North Korea🔴
War replaced by Cal football🔴
——————————————————————————-
Suggested Order
four different levels of utopianism:
LEVEL 1 — It sounds radical, but it's already normal somewhere
Free public transit
Universal school meals
Community gardens
Community land trusts
Vacancy taxes
Municipal broadband
Participatory budgeting
Citizens' assemblies
Car-free downtowns
Fur bans
Municipal housing
Local currencies
LEVEL 2 — Somebody is already experimenting with this
UBI
Four-day workweek
Police alternatives
Safe consumption sites
Food forests
Rights of Nature
Worker cooperatives
Neighborhood assemblies
Municipal grocery stores
Microgrids
Rewilding
LEVEL 3 — There are serious political movements proposing this
Police abolition
Landlord abolition
Corporate-homeownership bans
Land-value taxation
16-year-old voting
Worker takeover
Housing as a constitutional right
Direct digital democracy
Bioregional government
LEVEL 4 — We have completely lost our mindS
Komodo Dragons in Strawberry Canyon
Drone Babysitters
BART to North Korea
Pigeon Burrito Delivery
Municipal Compliment Department
Mandatory Zapata/Moonbeam/Guernica names
Therapy goats for every Berkeley resident
War replaced by Cal football