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Felecia Hatcher's energy invigorated us with a simple but transformative thought. #OurCityThoughts To leave the world better than we found. Here is a preview to her colorful interview. Join us Dec 6 for the Our City Thoughts official launch during Art Basel at the LAB Miami

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NPs that Make the Cube Turn:

Natalia Martinez & The Awesome Foundation

The Awesome Foundation is an organization that seeks to empower the community on the local scale. But despite its smaller budget, it still manages a wide impact.

The Awesome Foundation’s Miami branch is composed of 10 Miamians who donate one hundred dollars a month to those trying to make this city a more vibrant and enjoyable place to live. And they do it while minimizing the hierarchy that sometimes bogs down small scale community investors.

The Dean and Founder of the Miami chapter of AF is Natalia Martinez. She was born in Cuba and grew up living in cities around the world, with Miami being a big part of life before going to college. After living in Boston and New York for several years, she found herself coming back to Miami because of work and family.

“I didn’t want to feel like I was on an extended vacation, I wanted to feel like I was a civically engaged person.” She had heard about the Boston chapter of AF and began organizing a group of people to form the local board before she moved to Miami.

Natalia values simplicity and clarity in her nonprofit work. To keep clear lines of communication between the Foundation and contributors, she intentionally kept

the application simple. Not only that, but the Miami version of the AF website is the first in the country to have applications in Spanish and Creole.

“We want the people [in all the communities of Miami] to feel that if they have an idea that someone [will be] respectful and want them included.”

AF Miami also personally responds to the applicants, even if they are not chosen to receive the $1,000 grant, giving them feedback, advice and encouragement to keep applying. “Some people think, ‘the application is so easy so I’ll apply, but who’s going to take it seriously?’ and then they’re like ‘oh wait, these people had a conversation with me so I have to take this seriously.’ And then... ‘oh wait, they took me seriously enough to give me money.” This seemingly simple act of recognizing someone’s ideas and effort has been the turning point in several of the grantees lives.

One of Natalia’s favorite award recipients is the StreetWaves summer surf camp. The Streetwaves team had a problem: a shocking percentage of Miami’s inner-city kids have never been to Miami beach. With the help of the AF, the kids able to explore a whole new aspect of the city they live in, and enjoyably experience learning to surf.

Another AF recipient was for an art project called Framing It Up! When we live in a place for a long time it’s easy to take it for granted. The Framing It Up! project put up decorative frames around Miami Beach in the hopes of inspiring people to take a better look at their surroundings. The idea being that the world we live in is beautiful, but if we don’t take a good look we might miss it.

“If I have an idea then my immediate thought is, ‘why not - I don’t see why I wouldn’t try.” A major goal of AF Miami is to increase people’s confidence in their power to get things done. Part of Natalia’s hopes for the AF is to help Miami succeed in being able to reach its potential. She wants Miami to be a place where people are capable of doing great things they imagine.

-- Joshua Fay

And with you and the Awesome Foundation’s help, it’s going to be. Apply now with your idea to make an Awesome Miami!

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OCT Talks to: Marta Viciedo

by Josh Fay and Jose Leon

Marta Viciedo wants to SMASH your ideas on how to get around Miami. Marta is the Chair of TrAC, the Transit Action Committee, which is working to better Miami’s transit experience. Her movement is both constructive and destructive, building awareness for an integrated urban experience while challenging pre-existing notions about transit in Miami. With her background in urban planning and a love for the city she calls home, she is working to make Miami a physically more connected place.

OurCityThoughts: Why do you live in Miami?

Marta Viciedo: Miami has a huge amount of potential, and to be honest every once in a while I grapple with that a little bit. Maybe some other cities might be easier, but Miami has a ton of potential, we have the bones for a fantastic city. I do see a lot of movement in that direction. I see a lot of people coalescing around issues that are long-term, forward thinking, and about making this city better across the board not from a corporate and financial standpoint alone, but from a more equitable holistic standpoint.

OCT: How has living in Miami impacted who you are today?

MV: I think that being here has given me a particular patience and open mindedness to deal with the diversity of people, to build community on a very broad scale. I think here I have the opportunity to think in a very innovative manner. In some ways it’s rigid, but in others it’s a relatively blank canvas. There is a lot of room for opportunity, especially on the urban side. That’s affected me a lot particularly in the last two years where I’ve really dived into this issue. I think all the time about what I could do or what can make it better or reach more people. I don’t think I’d have the same opportunity in other cities.

OCT: Do you think there is already too much infrastructure around cars that it might not be easy to change?

MV: I don’t generally think in terms of whether it’ll be easy or not, because that conversation can go around in circles. So I think about what it’ll take, and I think about the little things and some of the bigger things. I think we need to make a TON of pedestrian crosswalks like the one in Wynwood (that’s very colorful) throughout the city, as a huge initiative. Better bus stops that are protected and covered from the sun, and cooler to look at. The streets like Kendall Drive or 8th Street, we need to make them so that they aren’t three lanes wide, but two lanes with a dedicated bus lane. We also need to make public transportation more visible. It’s not even in most peoples’ sights.

OCT: Briefly describe your ideal city.

MV: We need connectivity, first and foremost, the ability to connect across an entire city in a way that’s easy. It doesn’t need a longer Metrorail, it just needs better access and better communication and better connectivity. The folks in Brickell don’t talk to the folks in Little Havana, even though they’re three blocks away from each other. People in Overtown have their own insular group that doesn’t really talk to anybody. While it’s really cool to have those different identities, but when those identities start to hold you back you have a serious issue. If we had connectivity at the community level I think people would be more engaged.

She is the creator of Purple Line, a pop up transit station whose existence and exposure helped get TrAc’s message out. She currently runs an organization called Urban Impact Labs that works with people who are looking to do collaborative projects within the community.

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#Juanes showing #Miami a lot of love! #OurCityThoughts

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Checking out one of the coolest up and coming bands across the US #LasCafeteras #Miami #OurCityThoughts

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Miami Nights #OurCityThoughts

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OCT Talks to: Chantelle Morales

By Josue Maldonado & Josh Fay

Chantelle Morales is the founder of Tokyo Love Bots, a tech and hip hop inspired dance crew. Morales is a Florida International University (FIU) alum. A Miamian with Taiwanese and Puerto Rican parents. And an avid moon walker!

In college she enrolled in dance classes, but never found a hip-hop class that would teach her the style with the edge she was looking for. Since she could not find one, she created one - Morales began organizing workshops for hip-hop dancers.

Dancers of all skills showed up to teach and to learn from one another. From the “Summer Lovin’ Intensive” workshops to a community moved by music, her passion for dance is bringing over 60 people per class and the numbers keep growing.

OCT: How did you begin to organize your workshops?

CM: I’ve always been into creating my own shows and choreography, but I was never allowed by my parents. When I looked for hip-hop classes in Miami I found only commercial style, and I wanted the original style. I figured I couldn’t be the only one and so I used social media to see if anyone else would be interested in learning.

At the beginning it was just a few people who wanted to get together and practice and express themselves. We would listen to music at the session, and begin to groove with each other. Sometimes I would see people listening to a song and trying out moves, I’d tell them, “Hey nice work, try and make a routine by the end of the week.” Trying to motivate them. As we got more confident we would teach each other moves such as breakdancing, popping and locking.

Eventually we started to perform at FIU and began to compete. From there the interest began to grow and then we started to hold workshops for students. Then almost overnight we started to have more and more people wanting to learn the dances we were performing, so we opened up to the public.

OCT: What is your opinion of the dance community in Miami?

CM: I feel that it is segregated. Especially between “real” Hip-Hop and “commercial” Hip-Hop. The Hip-Hop that you see throughout Miami is more commercial, such as dances you see in music videos and in performances from the Miami Heat dancers.

I’m not into wearing little booty shorts and shaking my thing all the time, I enjoy the other aspects of the culture. It’s really different, but now that I’ve started these workshops I’ve found a lot of other people who feel the same way as I do and now we are growing.

OCT: If you could make Miami your ideal city what would you change?

CM: I wouldn’t change much. I appreciate the Latin culture that Miami offers. From the dance to the food it all adds to the exoticness and beauty of the city. However, I would like to see people be a bit more open-minded towards art and culture.

Also, I want to see more community-based efforts like my workshops and what you guys at OCT are doing. In Taiwan there are street performers everywhere. They aren’t really performers though, they are just people coming together to enjoy dancing. It’s be great to see that more in Miami.

OCT: Finally, when was the last time you were proud of Miami?

CM: As cliché as this may sound it would have to be when the Miami Heat won the championships. Restaurants were booming, bars and clubs were packed because everybody wanted to celebrate. It brought a lot of the city together to cheer on the team.

We will bring you more interviews with people #creatingMIAMI with their passions and goals.

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