It’s time for regeneration to be regenerated!

Austerity has had many victims, but the one I mourn the most is the regeneration community’s spirit. Five years of resource constriction by a government keen to sweep away any vestiges of their predecessors’ ‘big government’ spending – think RDAs, Planning Policy – before replacing them with their own ‘lighter touch’ structures – think Leps and the NPPF – has left those on the side of the angels feeling like they’re single-handedly pulling whole communities up a steep hill with a boa contrictor around their neck.

The mojo has left the building. Regeneration practitioners are knackered, and fed up. But we can’t leave it like that – something has to be done!

This is where a late night conversation with Jackie Sadek came in. We thought we needed to give the regeneration community back the joie de vivre that Dave and George had taken away. So that’s why next week sees the inaugural Re:Fest!, a gathering of regeneration  people which hopes to break some rules, and raise some spirits.

The event will take place in Nottingham, on a ‘live’ regeneration site – a disused secondary school. It is not a conference. It is not a corporate gathering. It is a festival focussing on all that is great in the regeneration sector.

While there will be a programme of speakers such as Bill Grimsey, the veteran retailer who has just published his alternative review of the high street, calling for increased community facilities and participation and less retail (yes, you heard it, less retail), the main events will be those brought along by the delegates themselves. It’s an ‘unconference’, where the content is not determined by some committee of grandees, but by the people who come along – by the people, for the people!

So Re:Fest! is part conference, part gallery, mostly user-generated, a big sharing experience, a celebration, and aims to be 100% uplifting and reaffirming. It aims to regenerate the regeneration community itself, providing sustenance and support, and giving its people renewed energy and determination.

There will be a Festival Knowledge Swap  area, for exchanging expertise; an exciting Regeneration Confessional – a ‘truth and reconciliation’ commission for regeneration where we share the not so great practice of the past, and create a list of lessons we’ve learned the hard way; a session on digital urbanism (sounds cool); and a range of other stuff.

The idea is simply to let the community talk about what they’ve been doing that is good – without support, budget, or resource in most cases – and through this unashamed celebration, to find inspiration to return to the daily grind of helping people up hills with renewed vigour and, yes, enthusiasm. Regeneration should be celebrated, it should be rewarding, and above all it should be fun!

The thing is, Dave and George (and in fact Ed and Nick and the rest) aren’t going to help. If the regeneration community wants to make the world a better place, it’s got to pull itself up by its bootstraps and get going.

It does no good to anyone sitting and bleating about having no budget.  We need to get on with what we can do without one.

The event is on September 17 & 18 in the former Lenton School in Nottingham. It’s free to attend. You can register, and see more information, at http://regenerationfestival.wordpress.com.

Come on, you know you want to!