Welcome to the Midwest Chapter!
The Midwest Chapter spans 12 states, making it the largest geographic chapter of IAP2 USA. We are happy to serve IAP2 members and friends who reside in North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio.
View our Chapter's Equity Statement here.
In September 2024, the Board approved a strategic plan that will help guide the chapter for the next five years.
Connect with us!
- Sign up for our chapter e-newsletter by emailing us at midwest@iap2usa.org
- Visit us on Facebook and LinkedIn
Save the Date for our 2025 Conference: April 23-25 in Omaha, NE. Visit our conference webpage for more information.
Connect with the Chapter
Join a Committee! Serving on a committee is a wonderful way to meet other P2 practitioners in our chapter's geographic footprint, as well as a powerful way to build your own skills and expertise. You could also service on one (or more!) of our committees:
Contact any of the board members below, or email us to learn more! |
Meet our Board of Directors
The Midwest Chapter Board of Directors has nine seats of staggered three-year terms. As part of the chapter's annual election, the call for self-nominations to the board is issued in October.
|
| Term Years: 2023-2025 | ||
 |
 |
 |
|
Dan Pfeiffer Minnesota *2025 President |
||
|
"I will share my planning experience working on the ground in Michigan engaging with rural, suburban, and urban residents of all backgrounds. I will bring an honest perspective about the merits of doing engagement well and the danger to doing it poorly." |
"Using my strengths, I would love to help grow the P2 profession and better establish it as a known professional practice throughout the Midwest. Through strategic collaboration and organized information and resource sharing, we can enhance the P2 work for many project types and communities in the Midwest (and beyond)." |
"I want to continue to bring my planning, leadership, and decision-making skills to the board and continue to expand our membership and recognition. In doing this, we elevate the importance of participatory governance and can help be a positive influence in the communities we work." |
| Term Years: 2024-2026 | ||
 |
 |
 |
|
MJ Lamon |
Emily Larson Minnesota |
|
|
"I feel there is an opportunity to better reach and serve those professionals who don't necessary focus all of their work on public engagement, but, like most in the public sector, find themselves having to 'do' public engagement regardless." |
"I am always drawn to serve in capacities that create spaces for others to learn and grow. Serving on a board is one role and leading committees is how we get the work done. My arranger, activator and strategic strengths allow me to make things happen by turning thoughts into action, organize with flexibility, and find routes to move work forward." |
"In my organization, I am a leader in facilitation and participatory methods. I bring this experience and focus to my work on the board. After filling a partial term on the board (2021), I feel I am just getting started with ideas and efforts around member engagement in our organization and am honored to continue that work." |
| Term Years: 2025-2027 | ||
 |
 |
 |
|
|
Lisa Morris-Helmstetler Minnesota |
Melody Henning Kansas |
"I am eager to make new connections and learn more about what others are doing in the world of communications and engagement." | " I believe in IAP2 and that this strong framework is necessary for any organization to fully understand community engagement and learn how to bring community in to develop together." | "I want to help build a meaningful and responsive support network for community engagement professionals on the front lines of addressing wicked problems." |
Chapter Events
Upcoming Events
Second Wednesday of the month, Noon Central Time Bites & Insights: March 12, 2025 Shared Governance: Reinvigorating Your Advisory Committee Local government agencies often struggle to connect with the community successfully: public meeting attendance is low, project feedback is received at the wrong times, the public holds limited understanding of agency constraints, and attention is focused on the few vocal opponents that show up at board meetings. Most local agencies have advisory committees designed to connect with the community, some made up of representatives of stakeholder organizations, others are represented by members of the general public. No matter the make-up, committees can grow stale and veer from their intended purpose. Learn how Metro Transit in Omaha worked to refresh, empower, and engage their advisory committee to create stronger community connections.Presenter: Nicole Ebat, Regional Metropolitan Transit Authority of Omaha Moderator: Leslie Yetka, City of Minnetonka, IAP2 Midwest Chapter Treasurer
Bites & Insights: April 9, 2025 Walking the Talk with Block Talks MAPA conducts Block Talks as a public engagement experience and data-gathering tool for stakeholders and citizens to experience the built environment of a neighborhood or community. These walk audits are designed to help community members identify strengths and weaknesses of the infrastructure in an area and initiate conversation between members of the community, policy makers and local businesses. Bringing subject matter experts and decision-makers together with those who live, work and play in an area helps spark connections that can make big things happen!Presenter: Laura Heilman, Metropolitan Area Planning Agency 2025 Conference: April 23-25, 2025 The 2025 IAP2 Midwest Chapter Conference, themed Weaving vibrant networks that energize engagement, will take place April 23-25 in Omaha, Nebraska at the Metropolitan Community College (MCC) - Institute for the Culinary Arts Building. | Past Events Bites & Insights: February 25, 2025
The Heart of Community Engagement: Listening Sessions We understand that without discourse and equity there is no real community engagement. To consider a future where communities feel heard and represented in the decisions that impact them, community engagers must do better. As agencies and engagement companies scramble to gather input from “underrepresented” voices, people have become more wary and outreach tends to become tokenized and shallow. So, how do you gather authentic feedback that results in driving your outreach projects and truly represents the communities being impacted? We propose that one solution may be community listening sessions or focus groups. This approach allows us to create partnerships with the community, learning from them and working side by side. Our session will highlight what we’ve learned about leading these conversations, our process to determine outreach, how to lead sessions with sensitivity, build trust, close the feedback loop, and examples of successful listening sessions.
Presenter: Brigitte Bjorklund, Zan Associates
Bites & Insights: November 13, 2024 Authentic Allyship: Get In Where Your Fit In This session will discuss One Omaha's new definition of neighborhoods, talk about asset-based community development and how we structure our assets from the ground up to help neighborhoods in their roles of social/economic development; accountability, transparency, and stewardship; and creating shared sense of community. We'll further discuss specifically what neighborhood change looks like when those three roles are maintained, which is knowledge increase, strengthened relationships, and built individual and organizational capacity and community ownership. The session is interactive with discussion questions, group discussion, and icebreakers. Presenter: Kimara Snipes, One Omaha, Omaha, NE Moderator: Alejandra Medina,Community Engagement and Partnerships Specialist, Minnesota Zoo View the recording here (passcode: *%gb99Uh) Bites & Insights: October 9, 2024 Bridging the Gap: What is Best for the Community vs What the Community Wants What happens when a large infrastructure project is needed to continue to supply drinking water to a community but the community doesn’t want the project to impact recreation in a beloved canyon? We bridge the gap. We will discuss the outrage, mistrust, and pushback the City Creek Water Treatment Plant project in Salt Lake City received from the cycling community when it was determined that the canyon would need to be closed to public access for three years. How did we prepare and involve the public in the decision? How did we navigate the pushback? What did we do when the project became a key issue in a political race? And how are we repairing the damaged relationships between the public and the public utility? Presenter: Jordan King, Kimley-Horn and Associates Bites & Insights: September 11, 2024 Intro to Public Participation (P2) Curious about public participation and how it can support your work and community? The IAP2 Midwest Chapter invites members and friends to join us for a lunchtime webinar that dives into what P2 is, the core values that drive it, and the ways IAP2 can support practitioners like you. Whether you're new to public participation or looking to refresh your knowledge, this webinar will provide valuable insights and practical tools to enhance your engagement strategies. Presenter: Andrea Gebhart, AICP, Planning & Engagement Department Leader, JEO Consulting Group, Lincoln, NE |
Subscribe to our mailing list