Local creative types are getting a new opportunity from the city of Austin to put their businesses and nonprofits on the map—literally. A series of 10 community meetings starting this week will gain input from local residents and entrepreneurs as part of Cultural Asset Mapping Project, or CAMP, an initiative from the city’s Economic Development department. The project will aim to identify where Austin’s culture lives and result in community-created maps of what Austinites value as important resources to their culture and creativity, Seibert said. The city of Austin's Cultural Asset Mapping Project, or CAMP, allows residents to weigh in online via an interactive map to identify cultural assets.[/caption] Participants who cannot attend the meetings can still weigh in online via the project’s interactive map showing locations such as theaters and places where residents can buy art supplies or listen to live music, said Janet Seibert, Civic Arts Program consultant. Residents can also pick up a CAMP mapping-in-a-box kit, gather 5-10 friends and participate in the same exercise, Seibert said. Seibert said CAMP’s rollout was inspired in part by the city’s move to the 10-1 system, in which the city is divided into 10 geographic districts and each district has a representative on City Council. “We knew when we went into [10-1] that there was going to be a shift from just thinking about downtown as a destination to neighborhoods being a destination, and so we wanted to highlight that,” she said. The process At the first meeting, which took place Aug. 20 in District 5 at the Manchaca Road branch of the Austin Public Library, residents answered questions about creative expression and used colored dots and other materials to plot cultural assets on maps of their neighborhoods. Although that process might look familiar to any resident who has participated in a neighborhood planning process or in a meeting for CodeNEXT—the city’s ongoing effort to revamp the land development code—Seibert said the focus for CAMP is honing in on creativity and the arts. For District 5, that meant identifying businesses such as Strange Brew's Lounge Side music venue, which she said also serves as something of a community center for the South Austin area. District 5 resident Jennifer Houlihan, executive director of local nonprofit Austin Music People, attended the first meeting and said the project presents a great opportunity for residents. “We think it’s a terrific effort. Cultural arts has been working on this for a long time, so we’re excited to see it actually moving out into the community phase. What it’s going to do I think is let people know a lot of the hidden treasures in their communities,” she said. She noted examples include small businesses such as Space Rehearsal and Recording; music venues Moontower Saloon and Indian Roller; and local coffee shop Radio Coffee and Beer, which hosts film screenings. After input is gathered through the meetings and online map, the CAMP team will put together a district map with cultural assets identified, as well as a directory of everything that is on the map. In October small groups will gather to evaluate the findings and compile a status report of what was found in each district and what cultural economic development strategies are recommended. Those materials will be presented to council members and considered when making decisions about proposed developments, she said. For details, email camp@austintexas.gov or visit www.austintexas.gov/culturemapping.