Read my TIF Challenge in Sheltforce. I am hoping some organization with staff, heft, resources, and passion will take this work over. The TIF Illumination Project needs a home! Reach me at tom@tresser.com.
I was interviewed by the dulcet-toned Mike Stephen for his “Outside the Loop” progam on WGN Radio on Saturday, February 28. We talked about greedy billionaires seeking billions of public dollars for private projects – like the Bears new stadium – and the need for a more expansive and generous civic imagination. It’s the first segment of the show.
** Sign this petition – “No Public Subsidies for Megaprojects! (ESPECIALLY for the Bears Stadium)“ **
I made a special offer to Mike’s listeners – 50% off the already low price of “Chicago Is Not Broke. Funding the City We Deserve” – Get the book with $5 billion of progressive and sustainable revenue solutions for Chicago for just ten bucks (plus tax and shipping)! What a civic deal! This offer is only good with the right promo code (listen and you will learn) and only through March 28. I produced this book in 2016 and in 2024 updated it with a whole new section! Order the book today – get multiple copies and start a civic book club :)!
Sign and share this petition directed to the leaders of the Democratic Party. It’s the only way to save democracy in America.
Super proud to have done this interview with longtime civic and creative scholar Bill Cleveland.
The great folks at The Nonprofit Quarterly have been publishing my essays on the focus and future of America’s nonprofit sector since last December. Here is the latest piece:
Here are the other pieces:
I am super proud and excited to announce that I am co-designing and will be part of the delivery of an amazing eight-week leadership/candidate training program aimed at artists and cultural workers that is being delivered by a partnership between the 100K Project, the National Guild for Community Arts Education, and the Cleveland Arts Education Consortium.
This is a civic leadership program designed to equip artists, cultural workers, and creative organizers with the skills, knowledge, and confidence to campaign and build people power at the state, local, and national levels. The program is via Zoom for two hours, beginning October 9. Learn more.
We are doing our first online leadership/candidate training program for creative workers! Learn more. Watch the information session video below to learn all about this creative, interactive, and powerful learning opportunity.
Read my piece from the Nonprofit Quarterly, “US Nonprofit Sector Documents Its Own Powerlessness. but What Will We Do?” from May of 2025. Answering my own call to action from The Nonprofit Quarterly, I am helping to launch the 100K Project! We seek to recruit, train, and propel 100,000 people from the arts, nonprofit, social services, education, and science sectors (and their supporters) to run for local office or help those with our values run as champions of service, science, justice, equity, peace, creativity, and the public sector. All permitted functions inside the 501 c 3 framework. Read this piece from The Nonprofit Quarterly “From Service to Power – Retooling the Nonprofit Sector.”
In reponse to the Disaster Election, I am hoping to start a movement for “More Public!” and “Great Public!” in America. We need to celebrate, defend, and extend all things “PUBLIC” – so follow and share via BlueSky -> https://bsky.app/profile/morepublic.bsky.social.
Super excited to see my account of the No Games Chicago campaign and its connection to fighting megaprojects that threaten to gobble up billions of public dollars and vast swathes of public land published today by The Nonprofit Quarterly!