Maybe your community’s identity has history baked into it, or maybe it has a strong sense of evolving culture. Perhaps the past informs the present, and your news organization has helped to highlight that connection. Regardless, an event that celebrates your community can coalesce those identities — and establish local media as the conveners, recordkeepers and storytellers of your community yesterday and today.
That’s what inspired local podcast and newsletter City Cast Portland to imagine 503 Day, a holiday and block party that celebrates civic pride. They translated the city’s 503 area code into a date — May 3 — and threw a five-hour event featuring local businesses, vendors and musicians, as well as city leaders, restaurants and local icons. City Cast built programming around the event and worked together with their audience to envision what a holiday celebrating Portland might look like.
City Cast chief creative officer Andi McDaniel spoke with senior producer Giulia Fiaoni for API on how 503 Day came about and how this approach makes sense as a journalistic endeavor. Below is an abbreviated version of their conversation.
How to create a holiday to celebrate your community
The idea for 503 Day emerged from a City Cast Portland staff meeting in early 2024, and Portland residents immediately chimed in with ideas, mottos and even a theme song, Fiaoni told McDaniel. That year, City Cast didn’t host an event but unofficially declared the holiday and built a content strategy around the idea. A city worker loved the idea so much he helped City Cast get the space for the block party in 2025, and made the partnership with the city more official.
Q: Describe the day for us — what was it like?
A: It was a big party right in the heart of downtown Portland. We erected this massive stage where we hosted local bands, with emcees that people know and love. There were artists and vendors and community organizations repping their things, and local food and drink for people to enjoy. It was free and open — it felt like it was everyone’s backyard. So many different types of people showed up, nearly 5,000 people by the end of the day. I saw so many people I didn’t expect to see — politicians, artists, service industry workers, community leaders, even folks from the houseless community found a way to engage.
I had people come up to me and offer to volunteer in the middle of the event. It caught me off guard how willing people were to engage! It was really fluid. There were so many moments when I talked to folks and they were like, this reminds me of Portland decades ago, when we weren’t suffering from these challenges.
Q: Why was it important for it to be a holiday?
A: Having 503 Day be an official holiday really solidified the celebration as important and relevant and something for everyone. It got the city and politicians and leaders involved in a direct way. It gives people a way to think about how they can get involved in civic work and community activation. It gives people something to look forward to — it means everyone is thinking about it every year and it’s a real priority.
Q: What was the goal?
A: From the start, the number one goal was uplifting Portland. The easiest way to do that was through partnerships and community activation. The planning became easier the more folks we got involved. The other critical goal was to establish our daily show and newsletter as an essential community hub. We’re not just a podcast, we’re a space for bringing people together.
Q: You don’t see a lot of media companies declaring holidays or throwing block parties — why does this make sense as a journalistic endeavor?
A: It’s no secret that the media is seen as divisive right now. In our community, folks are hesitant to engage with us, they even question the value of it. But chasing after an idea that is celebratory, collaborative and even silly starts to center local media as something that is FOR the local community, that works to better it. That invites folks to jump in beside us.
Something like a city block party can be a real equalizing force in the community. We want to create this point where folks come together and say, we’re all here and we all love Portland. It’s an excuse to come together that fills a hole people have in terms of community connection. Why not have local media address these issues? Why not have local media hold that space? We put in so much work to know the city as well as we do. Why not use it?
The skills and effort we put into knowing something so well we can report on it — those are the same skills involved in making a city better.
Q: What advice would you give to a journalism outlet considering doing something like this?
A: The area code approach might not work for everyone, but what’s really core is thinking about what your community celebrates every year. In Portland, when the cherry blossoms are in bloom, everyone goes to the waterfront to see them and celebrate with each other. But it can be as easy as the first river swim. Or when farmers market season starts. There’s really no limit when it comes to connecting to what folks are excited about where you live. Consider that before everything else.
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