20 years ago I submitted this final paper for UP 239 Utopias and Dystopias at UCLA Urban Planning. Read it here: Surveillance, Social Control, and Dystopia: An Annotated Bibliography on the “Security City”.
I learned so much from moderating this breakout session at the Build the Middle National Housing Convening 2025. And from feedback received thus far, session attendees gained many insights, tools, and practical action steps.
Big thanks to our panelists: Diana Gonzalez from Los Angeles County Department of Regional Planning, Tennis Wick from Permit Sonoma, Derek Ouyang from Stanford RegLab, and Awais Azhar from HousingWorks Austin.
TODAY: Collaborating with APA PA Chapter on the talk, “Embedded Planning: A New Praxis for Pennsylvania.” This webinar supports development of the Borough of Hollidaysburg Comprehensive Plan using Embedded Planning as a central theme. Street-level planning, coast to coast!
After concluding my lecturer role at Cal Poly Pomona Urban and Regional Planning on May 31, 2025, I decided to archive my faculty page here.
Guest lecture “Embedded Planning is Radical Planning” in the Radical Planning Collective’s student-led course at UC San Diego. We will examine the origins and implementation of Embedded Planning praxis as an application of Radical Planning.
My time at Cal Poly Pomona has come to an end. The last 4 years were a dream come true. In 2021, I’d never have imagined that 1 lower division course would blossom into 6 across our bachelor’s and MURP programs, including my personal goal of teaching planning theory (my favorite at UCLA Luskin!). With that accomplished, I’ve decided to exit on a high note. This move makes space for new lecturers . . . new ideas, new lessons, new texts, new assignments, new theories, new planning methods, new pedagogies, new critiques, new praxis.
I’ll miss my students. My greatest joy was being a part of their journeys. I got to see folks new to the field evolve before my eyes into fierce urban planners—change agents. I hope my ramblings contributed to their growth. My students give me boundless hope. The future of urban planning is in good hands.
I was a mentor before CPP and I remain one. I’ve formed lifelong relationships with CPP students, faculty, and university fam. Many believe in Embedded Planning and other forms of activist praxis. We have momentum.
So this isn’t a “goodbye” but rather a “see you out there, in the neighborhoods, alongside our community members, planning and organizing, with your feet on the street.”
Scenes from Duke University from my 4/10 guest talk, “Embedded Planning is the Future.” The invited lecture was delivered in partnership with the undergraduate group Duke Our Urban Future and Duke Urban Studies.
This is chapter 3 in the #EmbeddedPlanning story.
We begin in medias res amidst my high stakes confrontation with unnamed powerholding figureheads suspicious of Embedded Planning because it subverted top-down control. I retrace my steps and epiphanies as a zoning enforcement planner to create Embedded Planning in South Central LA’s Florence-Firestone community. Drawing from personal experiences, I reflect on the challenges and benefits of street-level planning in the face of power. I then present case studies of others doing Embedded Planning coast to coast — and beyond!
When you hear planners today talk about “meeting people where they are,” know that we’ve long called it Embedded Planning praxis. And now we’re a worldwide movement.
Photos by AJ Adovor & Avery Smedley of Duke OUF and Dr. Ashley Hernandez of UNC Chapel Hill Carolina Planning. Thank you, Duke urban planners, for inviting me to speak on your campus!
Join us 5/8 at CSUN Urban Studies and Planning for “Embedded Planning is the Future,” a public talk on the present and future of street-level activist planning.
Embedded Planning praxis shifts the planner’s work from a desk to the streets. Created during my Zoning Enforcement days in South Central’s Florence-Firestone community, this praxis aims to rebuild trust and foster meaningful relationships with marginalized communities harmed by inequitable planning.
We’ll highlight the spread of #EmbeddedPlanning coast to coast (and beyond!), with case studies, reflections, and personal experiences examining the challenges and benefits of street-level praxis.
Shout out to Dr. Brettany Kane Shannon for the invitation to return to CSUN URBS!
Save the Date! Join Casita Coalition for the 2025 Build the Middle Convening, happening: August 14–15 in Los Angeles! Mark your calendar. Follow for details. Let’s build what’s next.
Scenes from USC Architecture from my 4/3 guest talk, “Building Embedded Planning Praxis.” The invited lecture was delivered in the USC Master of Heritage Conservation graduate course, Heritage Conservation Policy and Planning.
This is chapter 1 in the story of Embedded Planning praxis.
I lay out my path to Embedded Planning which includes coming up as graffiti writer and hip hop kid in the 80s & 90s, dropping out of architecture school in ‘98, and then finding urban planning thanks to Mike Davis and Edward W. Soja (both rest in power). Embedded Planning was co-created with community members in Florence-Firestone in South Central LA.
Who’s the cat in the photo?! In 2003 in the MAUP program at UCLA Luskin Department of Urban Planning, I took an architecture theory course where I learned Professor Gregory Ulmer’s CATTt method for writing a manifesto. I would go on to use the CATTt to write my 1-page manifesto on Embedded Planning titled, “We Cannot Plan From Our Desks,” published in the October 2018 issue of APA’s Planning Magazine.
And now we’re a worldwide movement in planning theories and practices.
Photos by Meredith Drake Reitan, Professor & Associate Dean. Thanks for the invite to speak with your MHC students!
Join us at Whittier College Hartley House for “Embedded Planning is the Future,” a public talk on the present and future of street-level planning, followed by a feet on the street walking tour of Uptown Whittier.
Embedded Planning shifts the planner’s work from a desk to the streets. Created in the Florence-Firestone community in South Central LA, this praxis aims to rebuild trust and foster meaningful relationships with marginalized communities harmed by inequitable planning.
The talk features case studies, reflections, and personal experiences highlighting both the challenges and benefits of Embedded Planning in these times.
Coffee, tea, and pan dulce will be served. OUR EVENT IS FREE TO ALL.
When: Saturday, April 19, 2025, 10:30am to 1pm
Where: Hartley House, Whittier College, 13741 Earlham Drive, Whittier, CA 90602
Thanks to Whittier College Hartley House Hub for Integrative and Applied Learning in Social Justice for event support!
Here’s an alternative flyer designed by Duke’s neighbor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Shout out to the urban planning student in Dr. Ashley Hernandez’s class who dreamed up this remix!
I love the subtle rivalry at play here ha. But for real, my virtual talk in Dr. Hernandez’s UNC class “Diversity & Inequality in Cities” in 2023 led to our in-person event at Duke on April 10, 2025. See how Embedded Planning praxis brings us together?
Students, planners, and community: if you’re in Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill on 4/10 come through.
Also can we do flyers like this for UCLA Luskin / USC Price events?!
On April 10th, I’m at Duke University with Our Urban Future for the invited public talk, “Embedded Planning is the Future.” I consider this Chapter 3 in the Embedded Planning speaking series. We’ll discuss Embedded Planning’s trajectory — including origins, challenges, and benefits — and examine why this praxis is the future of planning.
After the talk, we’ll hold an extended Q & A to discuss my work on Middle Housing (Casita Coalition), Community Empowerment (Florence-Firestone Community Organization), and Urban Planning Education (Cal Poly Pomona Urban & Regional Planning).
Open to students, planners, and community — if you’re in Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill come through!
Big thanks to Duke’s Nicholas Institute for Energy, Environment & Sustainability for sponsoring our event.
Following our 2025 Board election, I’ve humbly stepped into my new role as Co-President of the Florence-Firestone Community Organization (FFCO). This leadership restructuring creates a more balanced distribution of president duties while providing our tireless founder and inaugural Board President, Steve Quinonez, with needed flexibility.
In our new arrangement:
FFCO remains an all-volunteer Board, supported by a dedicated part-time analyst and many passionate volunteers who serve because of our deep love for the Florence-Firestone community.
Interested in our food distributions, community walks, placemaking events, programs, or funded outreach? Hit me up or visit our facility at 6940 Compton Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90001.
I’m doing the guest lecture “Embedded Planning is the Future” at UC Irvine with the Urban Studies Students Association. The event is free to all on Tuesday, February 11, 2025.
Summary
Jonathan Pacheco Bell’s Embedded Planning approach revolutionizes planning practice by emphasizing street-level planning within the community rather than traditional desk-based methods. Developed by Bell in South Central LA and publicly introduced in 2018, this praxis seeks to rebuild trust and foster meaningful relationships with marginalized communities historically harmed by inequitable planning.
Embedded Planning involves planners working directly from community spaces and places, engaging residents in their everyday environments. This immersive approach helps planners gain a deeper understanding of local needs and aspirations, ensuring that community voices significantly shape planning decisions. By embedding themselves into neighborhoods, planners build strong, authentic relationships, moving beyond one-off, transactional, superficial consultations to create lasting and impactful partnerships.
Despite its support from communities, Embedded Planning has faced resistance from conventional planning practice and management, which has viewed this approach with skepticism. Working from the neighborhood to integrate community directly into planning processes challenges traditional methods and requires navigating complex dynamics between stakeholder expectations and regulatory constraints.
Since its inception, Embedded Planning has gained an international following among emerging planners who are eager to implement more inclusive practices. Bell’s talk will highlight real-world case studies, reflections, and personal experiences, while also showcasing the approach’s challenges and benefits. Attendees will learn how Embedded Planning fosters trust, informs better decision-making, and promotes more equitable community development. This emerging movement represents a crucial shift towards centering planning as an active and continuous process from within the community and represents the future of planning.
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