Mary Dellenbaugh-Losse

I am an urban researcher, consultant and author focusing on social inclusion, public participation and gender with more than ten years of experience working with public authorities, foundations, NGOs and non-profit organizations on gender equality in urban policy and planning, inclusive public participation, and public-civic cooperation and social innovation in local government.

I have more than ten years of experience in European projects and transnational knowledge sharing as a project manager, topical expert, facilitator, and assessor.

I was involved in URBACT III as the lead expert for the GenderedLandscape Action Planning Network and an ad hoc expert. My ad hoc missions included developing and delivering a training on gender and diversity for urban waste centres (for the URBACT Action Planning Network Resourceful Cities), developing and delivering a training on operationalising Sustainable Development Goals 5 & 10 (for the URBACT Global Goals for Cities Network) and developing two toolkits on designing gender-sensitive playgrounds (for the URBACT Transfer Network Playful Paradigm II).

I was also involved on a programme level, for example at the eUniversity 2020 where I designed and delivered the module about engaging stakeholders and my work together with Bianca Dreyer rebooting the #genderequalcities report. I am well versed in the use of digital tools and digital meeting design. In 2020/2021 I was also part of the Digital Support Expert team at URBACT.

Outside of URBACT, I work as an expert for gender mainstreaming in municipal policy and urban planning and design. I regularly offer consulting for German-speaking cities and regions on these topics, and am a consulting expert for gender mainstreaming at the German Federal Ministry for Housing, Urban Development and Building. I have given numerous interviews in German and English on this topic and I am currently under contract by Springer to write a book for municipal employees on gender sensitive urban policy and planning, to be published in 2024. This work has frequently involved expanding the existing knowledge base of gender mainstreaming in public policy, most recently regarding new technological solutions linked to smart cities and the gendered dimensions of municipal climate mitigation and adaptation plans.

In addition to my work on gender, I design and deliver inclusive, accessible and target-group specific participation formats in person and online in order to expand stakeholder consultation beyond “the usual suspects.” I was responsible for developing and managing the CIVACT project, which focused on the engagement of youth at risk of marginalization in five European cities. In addition, in my ongoing work around the Forth Meadow Community Greenway in Belfast, Northern Ireland, I designed and delivered broad and targeted dialogue and engagement, and the co-creation and implementation of a cross-community governance structure. This work focused not only on groups typically involved in PEACE projects, but also groups which have had less of a say historically, such as the disabled, migrants, youths, and the elderly.

I also offer policy analysis and design, spatial analysis, stakeholder workshops and roundtables, moderation, mediation, and concept development for public-civic partnerships and social innovation in local government. This includes resident-led projects such as urban commons, but also stakeholder groups around specific subjects, such as use of public space. Most notably, between 2019 and 2023, Ian Graham and I conducted consultation and guided the co-creation and implementation of a cross-community governance structure around the Forth Meadow Community Greenway in Belfast, Northern Ireland with a wide range of stakeholders from the public, private, and non-profit sectors. I also led two projects in Berlin on the development of a simplified permitting process for free open air projects, the Model Space Project and Kultur im Grünen, which brought both activists and municipal actors to the table.

Furthermore, prior to 2019, I conducted research on cultural & creative industries (including writing the 2017 book Städtewandel durch Kultur), intermediate & adaptive reuse of vacant buildings (including a 2018 project funded by the German Marshall Fund), and placemaking (which was one topic of my dissertation).