The Vision for Generation
Des Moines

Grow Des Moines

Des Moines should be a vibrant and growing city that leads the metro and the state. We need to grow in a way that ensures our community works for everyone and provides opportunity for all.

  • Diversify downtown by focusing on housing and cultural amenities to complement the business district

  • Create vibrant, accessible corridors that support small businesses

  • Create more housing of different types and at different levels of affordability

  • Support working families by increasing access to child care, health care, and grocery stores

Make our Community More Accessible

An accessible community is a community that works for everyone. We need to invest in basic infrastructure to ensure that our community is walkable, bikeable, and transit-accessible.

  • Ensure safe walking routes to schools, parks, and bus stops

  • Support a strong public transit system that connects housing to jobs, services, and amenities

  • Implement Vision Zero in order to reduce traffic crashes and fatalities

  • Repair existing roads, storm sewers, and infrastructure

Improve Public Safety

Our community doesn’t work for everyone if it doesn’t keep our residents safe. We need to support our first responders while improving how we provide public safety services.

  • Provide our first responders with the resources and support they need 

  • Improve public safety services by responding to more public safety calls with a mental health and social workers when appropriate 

  • Legalize marijuana and treat it like alcohol

  • Implement strategies to reduce gun violence and intimate partner violence

Invest in Neighborhoods

Strong neighborhoods are what makes a city great. We need to create accessible neighborhoods that have services and amenities that enhance quality of life.

  • Partner with Des Moines Public Schools to ensure access to strong neighborhood schools

  • Improve neighborhood parks and access to trails

  • Create new housing on vacant properties

  • Incentivize neighborhood grocery stores and child care options

Build a Sustainable & Resilient City

We must ensure that our city is sustainable and resilient. We should lead on implementing local climate solutions and prepare our city for the challenges of climate change.

  • Adopt and implement the Climate Action and Adaptation plan

  • Transition the city to 24/7 100% clean energy

  • Align city incentives with sustainability and climate goals

  • Invest in green infrastructure to reduce flooding and stormwater problems

  • Convert the city’s vehicle fleet to electric vehicles

Affordable Housing

We can’t have a community that works for everyone without housing that meets everyone’s needs at a price they can afford.

  • Build more housing of all types at all price points

  • Require projects that receive city incentives to include 20% of the units at an affordable rate

  • Eliminate barriers to building housing in our zoning code

Comprehensively Address Homelessness

Homelessness is a complex issue that requires a comprehensive solution to ensure that our most vulnerable residents have the opportunity to live in a dignified way.

  • Build more permanent supportive housing with on-site services

  • Provide additional street outreach and social work services

  • Expand shelter options to reduce barriers

Protect Reproductive Freedoms

There are actions we can and must take at the local level to protect the rights of our residents, regardless of state laws.

  • Advocate for the codification of abortion in state and federal law

  • Provide a travel benefit to city employees to cover travel costs for reproductive health care that is no longer available in the state 

  • Prohibit discrimination based on reproductive care decisions

  • De-prioritize the enforcement of state laws that seek to criminalize abortion

  • Prohibit the use of city funds to store or catalog information about abortion, conduct surveillance or collect information to determine if an abortion occurred, or provide information to government agencies about an abortion, except as otherwise required by state law

Provide Strong Transit Service

A strong transit system is essential to connect people to jobs, health care, child care, grocery stores, and other businesses.

  • Fix DART’s structural deficit with new funding sources rather than service cuts

  • Improve transit service with greater frequency and more crosstown routes

  • Fill gaps in service with on-demand pilot options

Create a Welcoming and Inclusive Des Moines

We need to create a community that people will choose to live in and choose to stay in, where everyone is accepted for who they are.

  • Advocate for LGBTQ+ and reproductive rights

  • Improve language access to city services