From Fired to Fired Up: How One Strong Towns Member Turned Losing His Job Into Community Success

This week we are celebrating a million local heroes. These are the advocates—across North America and from all walks of life—who are leading the way in building stronger, safer, more resilient, and more livable communities. Something many of these leaders have in common is their understanding that the work of building stronger towns and cities is best done with others. The most effective and sustainable way to advocate for change isn’t as a lone actor but as part of a team. That is why more and more Strong Towns advocates are coming together in Local Conversations, gathering to talk about the Strong Towns approach, then putting it into action where they live.

John Holmes is one such leader. Holmes, a Strong Towns member in Charlotte, North Carolina, remembers the first time he encountered Strong Towns. It was 2020. He was reading books about urbanism: Janette Sadik-Khan’s Street Fight, and Jeff Speck’s Walkable City. Then, he found Strong Towns: A Bottom-Up Revolution to Rebuild American Prosperity, by Chuck Marohn. It was, Holmes says, “a huge awakening…a wake-up call.” Holmes had received his bachelor’s degree in history and German. After reading the Strong Towns book, he decided to pursue a master of public administration at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

Holmes drew local and national attention earlier this year when he was fired from his job as a manager at Chick-Fil-A after criticizing on social media the company’s plan to open a drive-thru-only store in a transit-oriented development site. “I said it wasn’t becoming of the brand,” Holmes recalls writing, “and it violated their value of stewardship.” He went in to work the next day and was fired for publicly critiquing the restaurant chain. Holmes had to go home and tell his pregnant wife he had just lost his job. 

Things got really wild, though, when he posted this on Twitter:

Just got fired from Chick-Fil-A for speaking up against the City Council's approval to rezone a CFA to drive-thru only. Do I regret it? Not at all.

— J🦃hn H🦃lmes III (@JHolmesLives) January 20, 2022

His story was picked up by the Charlotte Observer and Slate, among other media outlets (including Strong Towns).

Holmes didn’t want this to be a “one-off thing.” He wanted to channel the energy from the Chick-Fil-A story, as well as what he was learning in his MPA studies, into improving his city. He met with the two founders of a group called Charlotte Urbanists, Jacob Unterreiner and Spencer Early. Together, they relaunched Charlotte Urbanists with a new mission statement, values statement, organizational goals and priorities, and a few incremental projects they could start working on. Since then, says Holmes, Charlotte Urbanists has blown up.

Over the past year, Charlotte Urbanists has spearheaded initiatives focused on the comfort and dignity of bus riders, building a biking culture in Charlotte, improving safety at Charlotte’s five most dangerous intersections, and changing the conversation about how to build a better Charlotte. 

One of the group’s projects has been to install benches at bus stops in Charlotte’s historically disinvested communities and at the city’s busiest bus stops. John Holmes, Jacob Unterreiner, and other group members had observed a severe lack of seating at many of Charlotte’s bus stops. In true Strong Towns fashion, the Charlotte Urbanists crew started with a “small bet”: they spent $200 of their own money and installed a single bench (donated church furniture) at a single bus stop. They watched to see how the benched would be used…and if it was going to be defaced or stolen. The experiment proved a success, and since then Charlotte Urbanists have gone on to install 42 more benches around the city.

The group has led other tactical urbanism projects, as well. They experimented with traffic calming in south Charlotte. They initiate “311 bombing” campaigns that mobilize a large group of people to submit 311 reports at the same time about a hazard—for example, a crumbling sidewalk—in order to bring it to the city’s attention. 

Another project was to resurrect the city’s Critical Mass Bike Ride. Holmes estimates it had been almost 20 years since the last ride. Using social and traditional media, and connecting with other organizations, Charlotte Urbanists spread the word that Critical Mass was returning. They were expecting perhaps 50 to 100 people to attend the inaugural ride. Instead, 350 people showed up!

Recently, Charlotte Urbanists launched a series called Public Policy Power Hour. Holmes describes Public Policy Power Hour as a “street-level lecture that you don’t have to pay for, but which covers the really important things the average citizen should know about.” The “street-level” part is key because Holmes wants the conversations to be as accessible as possible. “We’re talking about city things,” he says, “and it is helpful to be able to point to examples as you talk. Once we have identified a theme, we try to meet in a part of the city that’s relevant to that theme.”

Public Policy Power Hour discussions are tied to the big issues facing Charlotte right now. Holmes also draws on his favorite urbanism books, as well as content from his graduate studies. The most recent event was structured around the Strong Towns book, the one that had been a wake-up call for Holmes two years before. Seventeen people attended the discussion. Perhaps the liveliest part of the conversation, says Holmes, was about the “soft default” facing many North American cities. People who live in “the Wedge,” the area of Charlotte that seems to get the most money and attention from the city, may have trouble foreseeing a soft default. But evidence is more abundant in “the Arc,” which includes poorer neighborhoods that have been underserved and disinvested. The conversation about Strong Towns was so robust that the group only got through half the book. They are picking it up at the next discussion. 

The Charlotte Urbanists group is at the absolute forefront of the Strong Towns movement. The second-best thing about my job as Strong Towns community builder is being able to meet local leaders like John, Jacob, and Spencer and to support them however I can.

But the best thing about my job is being able to introduce John and his fellow Local Conversation leaders to others. To other Charlotteans, when I emailed people on our email list there to tell them a local group had formed. To people who attend next year’s Strong Towns National Gathering in Charlotte. To you, in our articles and podcasts. And to other leaders starting or running Local Conversations in their own towns and cities. 

The work we at Strong Towns do to help start and support Local Conversations is only possible thanks to our Strong Towns members. There are 126 Local Conversations now, with literally hundreds more in the works. Their stories differ in the particulars from the Charlotte Urbanists, but they are alike in one all-important way: They are working with others to challenge the supremacy of the Suburban Experiment and demonstrate a new and better way to build our cities. Thanks to groups like this, and thanks to our “million local heroes,” I like our chances. If you are already a Strong Towns member, thank you for supporting our Local Conversations program. If you’re not a Strong Towns member, please consider becoming one today.

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