Inside the Civic Assembly on Housing
What We Celebrated, What We Learned
Ten weeks ago, 65 Akron residents walked into a room as strangers. Different neighborhoods, different ages, different backgrounds, different politics. Nobody knew what to expect.
Last week, we brought many of those same people back together — along with facilitators, community partners, and neighbors — to celebrate what they built. The event was called Inside the Civic Assembly on Housing, and it was equal parts reunion, reflection, and a look ahead at what's next.
How it started
The delegates weren't hand-picked. They were chosen by lottery, a process called sortition that goes back to ancient Greece. Out of roughly 580 Akron residents who raised their hands to participate, 65 were selected to represent the city's full range of neighborhoods, ages, races, incomes, and professions.
For ten weeks, they met in small rotating groups — six people plus a facilitator — switching tables each session so everyone eventually sat with everyone else. They learned from each other instead of being told what to think.
What was built
By the end, the Assembly had endorsed nine housing recommendations with 93% support. They tackled tough, technical ground: a system for civil citations in housing court, protections tied to criminal history as a housing barrier, zoning reform, and financial support for residents.
One delegate described changing his mind mid-process after hearing a fellow delegate point out that military veterans with PTSD are statistically more likely to cause harm than someone with a minor criminal record — yet veterans get housing preference while people with records often get shut out. That kind of real-time perspective shift happened again and again in these small groups.
What people said it meant to them
The recommendations mattered. But almost everyone on stage said the bigger change was personal.
Delegates talked about walking in guarded and leaving with a real community — people who'd grab their elbow when they were tired, run out to a car to retrieve a forgotten phone, or simply say "I got you" on a hard day. One delegate, reflecting on growing up in a tightly connected North Hill neighborhood, said the Assembly rebuilt something Akron has been losing: a sense that someone sees you.
Facilitators echoed that. They talked about trust being the ingredient that made everything else possible — trust that questions would be answered honestly, that confusion would be met with patience, and that every voice in the room actually mattered.
One delegate summed up her biggest shift this way: she'd learned that most residents have no idea that 56% of Akron's population are renters, and that educating her own circle of friends and neighbors is now part of her role. Several delegates talked about becoming "trusted messengers" — the people who can explain what actually happened in the Assembly, since it's easy for rumors to spread that these were politician-driven proposals rather than ideas built by 65 everyday residents chosen at random.
Why Akron, and why housing
Unify America's Chief of Democracy Leagues, Morgan Lasher, shared the origin story on stage. Civic assemblies like this one have reshaped policy in places like Ireland and France, and roughly a dozen have run in the U.S. so far. An earlier pilot in a small Colorado town taught Unify America an important lesson: parachuting into a community, running a great process, and then leaving doesn't build anything lasting. The community has to own it.
That lesson shaped everything about Akron. Rather than showing up with a topic already chosen, the team ran roughly 300 listening sessions across the city to find out what residents actually wanted to work on — and what elected leaders were genuinely ready to act on. Housing came up over and over from both sides, making it the natural first topic.
What's next
The work doesn't stop with a list of recommendations. Here's the draft timeline shared at the event:
August: The team is listening — gathering feedback on what worked, what didn't, and what residents want to do next. This also includes orientation and planning for how recommendations turn into real change.
September and October: Working groups start moving the nine recommendations forward.
November: The City — Mayor's office and City Council — will deliver its first progress report to delegates and the community on what's actually moved.
As Morgan put it, the hope isn't just better housing policy. It's city leaders learning to see residents as partners with real answers, and residents seeing their own fingerprints on the laws and budgets that shape their lives.
That work continues — in Impact Teams this fall, and eventually in Akron's next Civic Assembly.
