Joda ThongnopnuaRacial bias in public education, the power struggle between state and city governments, and the political woes of the white working class were among a host of topics tackled Saturday by a panel of speakers brought to Chattanooga by a local, urban policy startup.
“I couldn’t be prouder of the content,” said Joda Thongnopnua, executive director of Metro Ideas Project and democratic candidate for Tennessee’s State House District 30. “The attendees were super engaged.”
Around 75 people came and went at the new headquarters of Chattanooga Whiskey as seven speakers, including journalists, academics and policy experts, discussed existing divisions in America and theorized about possible solutions.
Paula Wilson, a professional mediator who lives in East Chattanooga, said she got a ticket to the weekend conference on the rural/urban/suburban divide, called A Public Assembly, because she worries about gentrification and wanted to make sure that the public policy discussion considered the needs of vulnerable Chattanoogans.
“I wasn’t sure what their objective was,” said Wilson. “So I thought, I better find out.”