Community organizer Shawn McDougal is a member of Oakland’s Community Democracy Project. He and his team are on a mission to give residents a say on how their city’s budget is spent. The effort began eleven years ago. There were some previous attempts to get a “People’s Budget” on the local ballot- those efforts came up short. But this year’s campaign seems to be making some progress in reaching its goal of 32,000 signatures.
Recently, Shawn McDougal spoke with KALW’s news editor Sunni Khalid about the campaign and what the realization of a “People’s Budget” could mean for Oakland and beyond.
