Our Blog + Latest News

Local Progress Members Demand New Approach To Transit Funding In New York

15 Local Progress members across New York sent a letter to Majority Leader Stewart-Cousins and Speaker Heastie, advocating for the passage A4120/S1981. The bills would direct the state Department of Transportation (DOT) to reduce Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) by 20% by 2050.
Photo: Josh Katz| The state should no longer design roads where pedestrians are just an afterthought, like this entrance to the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn.

New York Pols Back Gounardes’s Bill to Cut Driving by 20%

For decades, transit planners have widened roads and expanded highways as cities have grown. But these interventions have only increased traffic and worsened pollution. LP members in New York wrote to legislative leaders demanding state DOT take a new approach to planning.
People working together in a community garden (photo credit: Canva)

Once-in-a-Generation Opportunity for Local Leaders to Leverage Nearly Unlimited Federal Funds

We just released a new resource with our friends at the Congressional Progressive Caucus Center to help you take advantage of a once-in-a-generation federal funding opportunity!

LPNY State Download 🗽 | Housing, environmental, immigration work & more! | May 2024

This edition of the Local Progress New York newsletter covers our end-of-session legislative push and budget roundup!

LP Stands with Students and Condemns the Violent Suppression of Free Speech

As a network of local elected officials, we stand in solidarity with students calling for peace and denounce the use of law enforcement or carceral threats to quell discourse and dissent.

📬 LP Network Download | Taking action against criminalization, EATS Act, big labor win, job postings & more! | April 2024

Here’s a look at some of what’s happening across the Local Progress network this month.

LP School Board Download 📚 | New steering committee members, removing SROs, attacks on DEI, & more! | April 2024

Time for our school board newsletter. This month, we’re sharing the latest news and resources around the fight to remove police from schools, DEI debates, and advocating for strong, equitable public schools across the country.
A group of people listening to a presentation

Governing While Black: How the LP Black Caucus is Supporting Black Electeds Across the Country

Earlier this Month in Nashville, more than 20 Black leaders came together for the first-ever LP Black Caucus Convening. The group – which represented localities big and small, at all levels of local government – discussed what it means to govern while Black and how we can harness that collective power for transformative change.
Group photo of the 2024 Leadership Collaborative

Local Leaders Nationwide are Building Power by Sharing It

Last week, over 50 local leaders and partners committed to shared governing power convened in Nashville, Tennessee last week to strategize and build community at the second-annual Leadership Collaborative!
Factory workers and UAW union members form a picket line outside the Ford Motor Co. Kentucky Truck Plant in the early morning hours on October 14, 2023 in Louisville, Kentucky. (Michael Swensen / Getty Images)

Workplace Militancy Isn’t Enough for Labor

Progressive labor movement must collaborate with like-minded local, state, and federal elected officials through networks such as Local Progress, the State Innovation Exchange, and the Congressional Progressive Caucus to expand and sustain hard-won gains.

180+ State and Local Elected Officials Urge Congress to Reject the EATS Act

LP and the State Innovation Exchange (SiX) released letters calling on Congress to protect local and state governments ability to create policy that is responsive to the issues their own communities face in the agricultural industry. 

Meet our new LP Board members! 🎉

As our network has grown and transformed, so too has our Board. Today, we’re excited to share some exciting updates and introduce our three new board members.

Have a Media Inquiry?

Local Progress is a movement of local elected officials advancing a racial and economic justice agenda through all levels of local government. We are elected leaders who build power with underrepresented communities and fight to reshape what is possible in our localities all across the country. 

Want to get in touch with us for a story? Reach us at press@localprogress.org.

In The News

At Local Progress, we seek to make the aspirational pragmatic by showing how government can be a tool to create just and equitable outcomes and reshaping peoples’ understanding of governing from an institution to a collective responsibility. Here are some highlights of our media coverage:

Small child receiving medical care reaching out from a bed (Photo by Dzulhaidy Abdul Rahim / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

I’m the Mayor of St. Paul. Here’s How Our City Is Erasing $100 Million in Medical Debt.

More and more local governments are using federal funds to relieve residents’ medical debt. Mayor of Saint Paul Melvin Carter explains why it's a simple, straightforward way to meet our communities’ needs.
Congressman Greg Casar speaks to protesters at the Governor’s Mansion against the Death Star Bill on Sept. 7, 2023. The protest was organized by the Workers Defense Project who want to protect the mandated rest breaks for workers outlined in local Austin ordinance. | Photo received from Kevin Kim (The Daily Texan)

Opinion: One Year Later, Local Leaders Must Be Bold Despite “Death Star” Law

July 1, 2024 marks one year since the City of Houston sued the state of Texas over the Death Star law. San Marcos City Councilmember Alyssa Garza makes the case that now is the time to be bold – to advance policies that uplift the very communities our legislature wants to silence.
social housing in Vienna, Austria

Is this European city a model for Philadelphia’s affordable housing? One Council member thinks so

Philadelphia City Councilmembers Jamie Gauthier and Kendra Brooks visited Vienna earlier this year with Local Progress to learn about its housing polices.
Photo: Josh Katz| The state should no longer design roads where pedestrians are just an afterthought, like this entrance to the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn.

New York Pols Back Gounardes’s Bill to Cut Driving by 20%

For decades, transit planners have widened roads and expanded highways as cities have grown. But these interventions have only increased traffic and worsened pollution. LP members in New York wrote to legislative leaders demanding state DOT take a new approach to planning.

press Releases

After Grants Pass: organizing to house all our neighbors

In response to the Supreme Court's cruel decision in Grants Pass v. Johnson, we will continue to organize for housing for all.

Local Progress Condemns Cruel Supreme Court Decision in Grants Pass v. Johnson

In response to the Supreme Court’s decision in Grants Pass v. Johnson, Local Progress put out the following statement.

180+ State and Local Elected Officials Urge Congress to Reject the EATS Act

LP and the State Innovation Exchange (SiX) released letters calling on Congress to protect local and state governments ability to create policy that is responsive to the issues their own communities face in the agricultural industry. 

Local Leaders Denounce Senate Deal That Would Gut Asylum

In response to the Senate’s proposed border deal that would gut asylum in exchange for foreign military spending, Local Progress released this statement.

📬 LP Network Download | Traffic safety, ceasefire, history in Minnesota, & more! | January 2024

Here’s a look at some of what’s happening across the Local Progress network this month.