The Rockefeller Foundation has opened up the nomination process for the 2008 Jane Jacobs Medal. The deadline to submit a nomination is February 1.
The award, launched last year, recognizes "two living individuals whose creative vision for the urban
environment has significantly contributed to the vibrancy and variety
of New York City." Last year, Transportation Alternatives co-founder Barry Benepe received the Lifetime Leadership award and Omar Freilla of Green Worker Cooperatives won the Medal for New Ideas and Activism. The medal is accompanied by prizes totaling $200,000. Not too shabby!
Here is the award criteria:
The Jane Jacobs Medal will be given each year to two living
individuals whose creative vision for the urban environment has greatly
contributed to the vitality of New York City and who exemplify the
following values and ideas:
- Make New York City a place of hope and expectation that attracts new people and new ideas
- Challenge traditional assumptions and conventional thinking
- Promote dynamism, density, diversity and equity
- Generate new principles for the way we think about development and preservation in New York City
- Take a common sense approach to complex problems
- Provide leadership in solving common problems
- Respect neighborhood knowledge
- Generate creative use of the urban environment
- Demonstrate activism and innovative cross-disciplinary thinking
- Give us new ways of seeing and understanding our city
And, again, here is where you can find the online nomination form. What names are people kicking around this year?
