Colorado Urban+Rural Connect

Name: Colorado Urban+Rural Connect
Start: 2025-11-09T16:30:00-07:00
End: 2025-11-09T18:30:00-07:00
Location: Bohemian Biergarten

Schedule

Sun Nov 09 2025 at 04:30 pm to 06:30 pm

UTC-07:00

Location

Bohemian Biergarten | Boulder, CO

You are invited to Department of Public Transformation’s Colorado Urban+Rural Connect: featuring Ash Hanson, Founder & Creative Executive Officer (CEO) of Department of Public Transformation in conversation with Evan Weissman of Warm Cookies of the Revolution.
Join us to learn about creative changemaking work in rural places across the United States and to connect around urban+rural solidarity.
We’ll share stories about the power of working with artists in civic life, joy as an essential ingredient in community work, what it means to be a good neighbor across geographic and political lines, and why this work matters.
An intimate happy hour conversation at the Bohemian Biergarten in Boulder, CO, hosted by Department of Public Transformation—a nonprofit organization working at the intersection of creativity, civic life, and change in communities across rural America.
✨ Sunday, November 9, 2025 | 4:30 – 6:30 PM *program starting at 5pm
✨ Bohemian Biergarten (Back Room) | 2017 13th Street, Boulder, CO
✨ FREE to attend | RSVP requested
✨ Snacks provided; beverages available for purchase
✨ Visit link.publictransformation.org/UrbanRural25 to register
Can’t make it, but still want to show your support? Visit link.publictransformation.org/donate or text DoPT to 44-321
Department of Public Transformation is a nonprofit organization that develops creative strategies for increased community connection, civic engagement, and equitable participation in rural places.
Presenter bios:
✨ Evan Weissman is the founding director of Warm Cookies of the Revolution, a civic health club that blends innovative arts and culture with crucial civic issues. Prior to founding Warm Cookies of the Revolution, he spent 12 years as a company member of the collaborative Buntport Theater Company, who the Denver Post called "Monty Python’s anarchist grandchildren," winning over 100 awards as playwright, director, designer, and actor. His work with Warm Cookies includes creating over 400 arts-based civic programs (live events, installations, videos, music, and books). Evan was awarded a Roddenberry Fellowship, a Livingston Fellowship, as well as the Colorado Governor’s Award for Creative Leadership and Parr Widener Civic Leadership Award. He was Denver Commissioner for Cultural Affairs, and Creative-in-Residence at the Denver Art Museum. Evan is a US Ambassador for the Royal Society for Arts. Evan teaches courses on nonviolent social change at Colorado College. He was the founding organizer of Colorado Bend The Arc: A Jewish Partnership for Social and Economic Justice, and co-founder of the Denver chapter of Jewish Voice for Peace. He was a Jane Addams-Andrew Carnegie Graduate Fellow at Indiana University’s Center on Philanthropy as well as a Kellogg Foundation’s Leadership for Community Change Fellow with Mi Casa Resource Center for Women. Evan is horrible at drawing and swimming, among many other deficiencies.
✨ Ash Hanson (she/her) has over 20 years of experience working with rural communities to activate stories, connect neighbors, and exercise collective imagination. She is the Founder and Creative Executive Officer (CEO) of Department of Public Transformation, a nonprofit working at the intersection of creativity and civic life with rural communities across the country. She is also the founder of PlaceBase Productions, a theater company that creates original, site-specific musicals celebrating small-town life and exploring imagined futures. Ash is a rural cultural worker, social practice theater artist, enthusiastic arts administrator, and fierce advocate for rural people and places. She was an Artist-in-Residence in both the Planning Department at the City of Minneapolis and with the Southwest Minnesota Housing Partnership, where she employed creative community engagement strategies for equitable participation in urban and rural planning processes. She has presented on numerous stages (Obama Summit, Rural Assembly, League of Minnesota Cities, Rural Arts and Culture Summit), had interviews on a number of podcasts and radio/tv programs (Funding Rural, Reframing Rural, Filling the Well, Postcards & View From Here: Pioneer PBS, MPR News), and had articles in multiple regional and national publications (Washington Post, CNN, MinnPost, Creative Exchange, Star Tribune, The Daily Yonder). She was named an Obama Foundation Fellow and Bush Fellow for her creative civic leadership work with rural communities. She holds an MA in Applied Theatre with a focus on Rural Community Development. She is a Leo, an outdoor enthusiast, and a lover of magic and adventure, who believes deeply in the power of sharing stories on front porches, karaoke as an organizing strategy, and the overuse of exclamation points!