City Repair Documentary Film

***If you missed the campaign and still want to donate, contact the director at [email protected]***

Director Karney Hatch's new documentary has been in the back of his mind since 2012.  With the working title "The Village and the Grid: Repairing Our Cities", it focuses on the City Repair Project which began in Portland, Oregon and has since spread to more than forty other cities in the country.  The film will focus on the group's co-founder, Mark Lakeman, an architect and visionary community organizer.  Mr. Lakeman has been giving slide shows and workshops for over twenty years - the film will capture the essence of these presentations and combine them with the stories of several participants in this year's Village Building Convergence.

City Repair, as they say on their website, "fosters thriving, inclusive and sustainable communities through the creative reclamation of public space."  They do this primarily through intersection painting projects and natural building and urban agriculture projects.  They have also been intimately involved in the tiny house movement and in innovative new solutions for the houseless population, such as the thriving Dignity Village in Portland.

The hope with the documentary is that the message of Mr. Lakeman and City Repair will reach many new eyes and ears and will inspire re-villaging projects across the nation and around the world.

Mr. Hatch has made two previous feature-length documentaries.  "Overdrawn", with Ralph Nader, is an expose of the predatory lending practices of the major national banks.  "Plant This Movie", narrated by Daryl Hannah, explores urban farming around the world and has played in environmental film festivals on five continents.

REWARDS!

$15 Get a digital download of the film within a week of the film's World Premiere.

$25 Digital Download of the film and YOUR NAME in the credits of the film as a contributor to this campaign!

$75 Digital Download of the film, thanks in the credits, and FREE ENTRY to every night at the central venue at the 2017 Village Building Convergence.

$100 Digital download, thanks in the credits, and a SIGNED COPY of City Repair's Placemaking Guidebook.

$125 Digital download, thanks in the credits, and FREE ENTRY to all of City Repair's events from now until next June, including every night of the 2017 VBC.

$250 Digital download, your name in the credits, and a SIGNED COPY of City Repair's Placemaking Guidebook, and a City Repair t-shirt.

$500 Host a community screning of the film!  You get a digital download of the film or DVD and a 1-hour Skype/video chat following the film with Mark Lakeman and/or Karney Hatch (your choice).

$1000 A digital download and an Associate Producer credit in the film.

$2500 Digital download, signed copy of the Placemaking Guidebook, and an Executive Producer credit in the film

The tax deductibility of your contribution may be affected by goods or services received. Please contact your financial advisor with questions regarding your donation.

Production has already begun, but documentary film is an editor's medium and doc films are created in the editing process even more than narrative films.  The majority of the funds raised will be used for post-production: editing, sound editing, color correction, and hiring a composer and sourcing music.  There is still considerable shooting to be completed, too, both in Portland and in San Luis Obispo, California, where one of the main characters of the film has started a local chapter of City Repair and is fighting the city to make sure their neighborhood remains a low-traffic area.

The projects we hope to inspire through the documentary have a proven track record of improving the health and well being of people who live in the neighborhood in which they have been undertaken.