Marti Brown

 
Marti Brown is a local government and urban planning practitioner emphasizing best practices and civic innovation. Currently, she is the Executive Director of the North Franklin District Business Association (‘Association’) in South Sacramento where she’s managing the completion of the Association’s Community and Economic Development Plan.
From 2009 to 2014, Marti was also a Councilwoman in the City of Vallejo, California. During her tenure, she spearheaded bringing Participatory Budgeting (PB) to the City of Vallejo for the first city-wide PB process in North America. PB Vallejo won the League of California Cities Helen Putnam Award for Excellence in September 2014. The City was also honored as a 2015 Code for America Government Partner this year – an application that Marti initiated before leaving public office. Since leaving the City Council, Marti has joined the Advisory Board of the Participatory Budgeting Project and, in her spare time, works to spread PB through out the rest of California and the country.
Marti has been featured on Fox News and California Forward. She’s also been quoted in the New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle and Sacramento Bee. She has been a public speaker and presenter at numerous conferences including The American Planning Association, League of California Cities, California American Planning Association, SXSW, Government Finance Officers Association and the Participatory Budgeting Project.
Prior to joining the Association, Marti spent 10 years as a Redevelopment Planner and Project Manager with the Sacramento Housing & Redevelopment Agency and the City of Berkeley. She was also a Market Manager and Cartographer in the Marketing Division of AT&T.
Marti holds a Master of Business Administration from Hope International University, Master of Arts in Geography from San Francisco State University and a Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Studies from World College West.
She speaks Spanish and Nepali.
Marti is also a recipient of the The Waterfront Center’s 2005 Clearwater Award for Excellence on the Waterfront.