Category Archives: stories

Join Journalist & Community Gathering for Civic Impact

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We hope our members will consider attending the Experience Engagement gathering this October 1-4 in Portland. This unique gathering is being supported by NCDD Board member Marla Crockett and NCDD Sustaining Member Peggy Holman, and we encourage you to learn more in the announcement that Peggy recently shared with us below. Take advantage of their freelancer and student rates by registering here!

Experience Engagement

Experience Engagement, How Journalism and Communities Can Thrive Together takes place October 1-4 at the University of Oregon’s facility in Portland, Oregon.

This meeting is unique in both format and intention.

  • Unique in format because it brings together a diversity of people for a peer-based learning exchange, including journalists, community activists, students, educators, researchers, funders, artists, social entrepreneurs, librarians, technologists and urban planners.
  • Unique in intention because we see it as a working session to not only meet personal and organizational needs but to advance the field by producing an interactive field guide – a site that articulates the best of what we learn from each other, for example, principles and practices for engagement and evaluating its impact.

We are looking for a mix that would include about 40% journalists, 40% community connectors and story tellers, and 20% students, academics, and people from organizations that support journalists and community connectors.

Please bring your brilliance to the conversation on community engagement and civic life. Together, we can make visible the best of what is and imagine a great future for news and information that supports communities to thrive.

Space is limited to 125 people so register soon.

To learn more or to register, please visit www.journalismthatmatters.org/experienceengagement.

Cambridge Funds 6 Projects in City’s 1st PB Process

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In case you missed it, the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation recently shared a great interview with a Cambridge, MA city budget officer on their Challenges to Democracy blog highlighting the success of the city’s first-ever participatory budgeting (PB) process. It contains some great lessons learned and looks into the future of PB in Cambridge, and we encourage you to read the piece below or find the original here.

Cambridge Concludes its Inaugural Participatory Budgeting Effort

Ash logoCambridge residents welcomed spring with an enthusiastic show of democratic participation and civic activism. From March 22 to 28th, 2015, Cambridge residents age twelve and over were given the opportunity to determine a number of capital projects that the City of Cambridge would fund.

The voting was the culmination of a participatory budgeting process that had begun in December 2014, when Cambridge community members were invited to contribute ideas on how $500,000 would be spent on capital projects. Over 380 ideas were submitted using the City’s creative online platform.

Over forty “Budget Delegates,” volunteers chosen to research and evaluate the ideas, selected twenty promising project proposals to be voted on in March. Delegates were divided into four committees: Culture & Community Facilities; Environment, Public Health & Public Safety; Parks and Recreation; and Streets and Sidewalks.

Each committee was tasked with performing due diligence on project submissions – delegates made site visits, conducted community assessments, and consulted with City staff for input on the feasibility and cost of projects. The delegates then selected twenty of the most promising projects to put on the ballot with approval from the City Manager.

Over 2,700 Cambridge residents voted on the projects, either at one of twenty-five locations around the city or online. The following six projects received the most votes and will be funded in FY16:

  • 100 new trees and tree wells in low-canopy neighborhoods (1,441 votes, $120,000)
  • Twenty new laptops for the Community Learning Center (1,110 votes, $27,000)
  • Bilingual books for children (970 votes, $7,000)
  • Public toilets in Central Square (945 votes, $320,000)
  • Eight bike repair stations (917 votes, $12,000)
  • Free public Wi-Fi in six outdoor locations (875 votes, $42,000)

The allocations exceeded the $500,000 set aside for the pilot PB process, but the City chose to authorize the sixth project rather than scale it back. The total for all six capital projects is $528,000.

Building on the momentum of the first PB process, the City of Cambridge has authorized another round of PB to begin this summer. Meanwhile, City staff has initiated a process of feedback and reflection for residents and volunteers, with a formal session taking place on May 5th and the option of completing an online survey.

I recently spoke with Michelle Monsegur, an analyst at the City of Cambridge Budget Office. Monsegur, who helped oversee much of the PB process, shared her thoughts in response to my questions on this inaugural round of PB. Below is the text of our correspondence, edited for length and clarity.

Derek Pham: From the operations side of running this program, could you offer some comments on what you felt was one or two key lessons in implementing your first PB?  

Michelle Monsegur: One key lesson was that the pilot process’ timeline did not work well.  The proposal development phase of the process took place from January to March, which was tough for Budget Delegates (snow hindered site visits and transportation to meetings), City staff (busy with snow removal operations and budget season), and Budget Office staff (we put the City’s budget together from January- April). We are shifting the timeline so that the second PB process begins in May/June 2015 and wraps up before the holidays in December 2015.

In addition to a community feedback session, we’re disseminating a survey so that we can collect advice from a broad range of participants on how to improve the second time around.

DP: What percentage of Cambridge’s eligible voters took part in the voting of the projects? 

MM: The Steering Committee set a goal of 3,000 voters and defined voter eligibility as Cambridge residents who are at least 12 years old.  2,727 people voted in the pilot PB process, which was close to that goal and a good starting point.  Hopefully we’ll see many more people participate in the coming years.

We were the first city in the US to offer an online voting component for PB (ours was text message-authenticated), and we did that to make the process more accessible.  Although we held 25 voting events around Cambridge from March 22-28, 72% of the people who voted did so online.

DP: Building off the momentum of the first round of PB, what two or three things will you focus on as you move into the second round? 

MM: We would like to focus on additional outreach channels to spread the word about PB, including offering more information and materials in non-English languages. We may try to recruit a Steering Committee that is more connected to the local nonprofit community so that we can use those networks to reach more people. If the next Steering Committee decides that the minimum voting age should remain 12, we’d like to work with the schools to make sure all eligible students know they can participate in this process.

DP: Finally, what are two pieces of advice for cities interested in also starting up a PB initiative? 

MM: Public participation in the pilot process exceeded our expectations, so we recommend PB for municipalities who have a goal of getting residents more involved in the budget process in a meaningful way.  However, PB requires a tremendous amount of staff time and once you introduce PB, it would be very difficult to take it back, so cities need to be prepared to make a serious commitment to the process.

– — –

Many thanks to Michelle for speaking with me. As I wrote in an earlier post, in the beginning phases of Cambridge’s PB process the Steering Committee articulated four goals it wanted achieved through this endeavor. Though Cambridge will undergo its own evaluation of whether these goals were achieved, it is worth considering some of these goals.

First, make democracy inclusive. PB extended the vote to all residents twelve and over, allowed residents to easily participate in submission of ideas, and offered community meetings to gather a diverse mix of ideas and perspectives.

Second, have a meaningful social and community impact. Though perhaps harder to measure in the short term, residents voted on projects that would make the community a more attractive place to live. Residents now have more bike infrastructure, more trees, and outdoor Wi-Fi. The laptops and bilingual books are an investment in the future of the city’s human capital. All these projects suggest a positive, meaningful impact.

Third, create easy and seamless civic engagement. Rather than have City administrators decide on the projects, the City invited residents to volunteer as budget delegates. Moreover, the City leveraged technology to help bring in multiple voices and ideas in the process.

Fourth, promote sustainable public goods. The community will not only share in the benefits derived from the projects, but will also share in the benefits of the PB process, in general. There is greater social cohesion, greater civic advocacy, and greater attention to the role of the individual and his/her ability to affect positive change.

Cambridge’s successful first cycle of PB demonstrates the resiliency of democratic innovation and its ability to inspire and bring others together to advance solutions to shared concerns. A big thanks goes to the entire City of Cambridge’s PB planning team, Jeana Franconi and Michelle Monsegur from the Budget Office, and all Cambridge residents for taking on this valuable initiative.

As Cambridge heads into its second round of PB this month, visit the website for more information on how to submit ideas, get involved, and vote for projects. The City is currently setting up meetings between budget delegates and City staff to talk about implementation of the winning projects and working on a branding strategy that will make PB ubiquitous in Cambridge. The City has placed a call for new Steering Committee Members and is accepting applications until June 19.

You can find the original version of this Challenges to Democracy blog post at www.challengestodemocracy.us/home/cambridge-concludes-its-inaugural-participatory-budgeting-effort/#sthash.5o9H5E1G.ptVKXn6t.dpuf.

Featured D&D Story: Reforming the Barcelona Football Club

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Today we are happy to feature another great example of dialogue and deliberation in action. This fascinating mini case study from Spain was submitted by NCDD Founding Member Alberto Lusoli of QuattrodiTre (4d3) via NCDD’s Dialogue Storytelling Tool. Do you have a dialogue story that our network could learn from? Add your dialogue story today!

ShareYourStory-sidebarimageTitle of Project:

Reforming the Barcelona FC, One Opinion at a Time

Description

The Manifest Blaugrana Association was born to promote a greater and equal participation of all the Futbol Club Barcelona members, to improve its democratic processes, and to go beyond the usual and common football club paradigm, based on a clear separation between the fans and administrators.

Organized and supported by about 200 shareholders of the Barcelona Futbol Club, the aim of the “Debats” initiative is to provide the next President with a set of guidelines collectively written by the members of the association and fans of the club. As 4d3, we have been involved in providing and customizing our collective decision-making platform Deebase to their needs.

Should the members’ register be opened, thus allowing the entry of new members? May the club set a salary cap regardless of UEFA regulations? These issues, among many others, are now finally open to fans’ discussion. Thanks to the Deebase deliberation process, which includes a scoring system and an assessment of opinions and arguments, ideas will be compared and voted by the community, allowing the most popular to bubble up.

The project has been released in conjunction with the electoral campaign that will lead to the election of the new president of the Club on July 18th. The aims of the project are:

  • to provide to the future President a set of guidelines developed collectively by Barcelona’s fans and shareholders.
  • to regularly publish and send to the Club’s management the results of the deliberations

What was your role in the project?

Technology supplier / Co-designer

What issues did the project primarily address?

Associació Manifest Blaugrana (Barcelona)

Lessons Learned

Lost in translation: one of the biggest challenges that we faced during the design phase was to translate the platform in Catalan and Spanish. Since the participants will be mainly Catalan native speakers, it was fundamental to provide a platform fully translated into Catalan. However, at the same time it was necessary to make the platform available and understandable also to Spanish, non-Catalan speakers. Therefore, having a system capable to manage different languages, and providing a hybrid Spanish-Catalan version of the platform was necessary in order to lower adoption barriers.

Where to learn more about the project:

Link to the initiative: http://debats.manifestblaugrana.cat
Link to the platform: http://deeba.se
Link to the association: www.manifestblaugrana.cat
Photo: www.manifestblaugrana.cat/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/rebut.png

Reflections on a Text, Talk, Act Dialogue on Mental Health

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We want to share an update on Text, Talk, Act – the youth mental health conversation initiative launched in 2013 by NCDD-supported Creating Community Solutions – that we saw on NCDD organizational member the Public Conversations Project‘s blog. They featured a piece by Nancy Goodman reflecting on the what was discussed in the TTA conversation she facilitated with high school teens, and it gives a great glimpse into how TTA works and how powerful these dialogues are.

We encourage you to read Nancy’s piece below or find the original PCP post here. Learn more about Text, Talk, Act by clicking here.

Teens Talk Mental Health

I am a transition coordinator at Gloucester High School and a Public Conversations training alumni. In May, I facilitated a group of students coming together to discuss the stigmas around conversations about mental health as part of the nation-wide “Text, Talk, Act” campaign, of which Public Conversations Project was a partner. The conversation was deeply personal, but also indicative of the more broadly felt silence we as a society hold around this topic. Here are some of the questions and ideas we explored together.

Why is mental health a hard topic to talk about?

The students’ answers included, “You can’t see it – compared to physical illness,” “We’re under so much pressure to be perfect, to be acting as if we’re coping well,” and “There’s such a stigma associated with mental stuff.”

How closely has mental illness affected you?

Three of the six students described experiencing some depression or anxiety; one of them had tried to commit suicide last winter. I was taken aback by this revelation and grappled with how to respond. I asked whether others in the group had been aware of her struggle. Some reported having had a sense that something was wrong and others had not known. The students took her announcement in stride, and it did not become a focal point of our conversation. One described struggling with PTSD and OCD. Another has siblings with autism and Asperger’s. Two reported that they have not had close contact with mental illness.

What has been helpful and not so helpful?

Students reported that the school psychologists are sometimes helpful and sometimes not helpful, that drama club has been a “lifesaver,” and that medication has been helpful. One girl reported that, even though she resisted her at first, she now loves her therapist a lot. One of the girls who described herself as generally upbeat said that something that is not helpful is people coming up to her and asking if she’s ok just “because I’m not all smiley and happy that day.” Another student said, “I am only close to two friends. Sometimes I wish other people would reach out and invite me to hang out.”

What’s the definition of mental health?

  1. No one is 100% healthy.
  2. It’s liking who you are as a person.
  3. It’s about eating well and staying active.
  4. It’s being able to ask for what you need.

What do you want to/are you willing to do next?

Although students liked the idea of talking more, they felt strongly that they didn’t want to become “spokespeople” for mental health. They felt they would be too vulnerable to the ignorant reactions from certain students. The two drama club students expressed interest in going through a similar set of questions within the drama club.

Facilitator’s perspective:

As the group facilitator, there are two impressions from the conversation I’d like to share. First, with all the work that has been done to empower young women, several of these girls undermined their own comments by giggling after they made a point or shared something personal. Beyond nervous laughter, this behavior betrayed a real discomfort with their own stories, not just the difficult topic at hand.

My second impression is that, as a society, we’ve chosen to medicate our children rather than to relieve the conditions that are contributing to their mental illnesses.

Overall I was thrilled to be part of this authentic conversation about a topic of real concern to these students.

You can find the original version of this Public Conversations Project blog post at www.publicconversations.org/blog/teens-talk-mental-health#sthash.q8gyIMri.dpuf.

NPR Covers Deliberative Polling Efforts in Tanzania

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We recently read a fascinating article from NPR on the cutting edge work being done by NCDD member James Fishkin of the Center for Deliberative Democracy when he shared a link to the article a few days ago on our NCDD Discussion Listserv. It’s a story that we think would interest many of our NCDDers, especially those doing D&D work across cultures.

James and the CDD have been advancing the technique and process of deliberative polling for years. They have recently been experimenting with deliberative polling in Tanzania around questions of how to spend the African nation’s forthcoming natural gas income, and the process has been filled with expected and unexpected challenges, which the article explores.

Here’s how the article starts:

It’s Not A Come-On From A Cult. It’s A New Kind Of Poll!

You get a visit by someone you’ve never met before. You’re invited on an all-expense paid trip to your country’s biggest city for a two-day meeting on natural gas policy.

Oh, and if you show up you get a free cellphone!

It might sound sketchy. But it’s actually an innovative strategy that is being tested by researchers at a Washington, D.C.-based think-tank, the Center for Global Development, or CGD, to help the African nation of Tanzania decide how to spend its expected windfall from new discoveries of natural gas.

Participants listened, they asked questions and then they went home, where they’ll be polled on their views.

The approach was actually first developed in the late 1980s by James Fishkin, a professor at Stanford University. Fishkin has devoted his career to persuading leaders to consult their citizens before making difficult policy decisions. But he says you can’t just do a poll.

“If you have ordinary polls people usually are not well-informed. You don’t want to follow public opinion when the public just has a vague impression of sound-bites and headlines.”

So Fishkin created what he calls a “deliberative poll.” You gather a representative sample of a population for a one- or two-day meeting. You give them tutorials on the issue and a chance to question experts from all sides. Then, you send them home and poll them…

The article gets much more interesting from there as it goes into the challenges of literacy and low education rates in Tanzania as well as some of the unusual cultural hurdles that James and his team had to overcome in getting rural Tanzanians to participate.

We encourage you to read the full article, or you can listen to the radio version of the story by clicking here.

You can find the original NPR story by visiting www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2015/05/18/406462789/its-not-a-come-on-from-a-satanic-cult-its-a-new-kind-of-poll.

Can Gamification Help Fight Civic Apathy?

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We wanted to share this post about a fun project called the CivCity Initiative that we found on the Gov 2.0 Watch blog, which is run by NCDD organizational member,the Davenport Institute. You can read it below or find the original here.

DavenportInst-logo

The Engagement Game

We have written a fair amount about gamifying civic engagement. Mary Morgan and Dave Askins, publishers of the local Ann Arbor Chronicle in Ann Arbor Michigan have partnered with existing programs to gamify local storytelling and are now looking for ways to do more:

CivCity’s website and Twitter feed refer to the mission of “cracking the nut of civic apathy.” CivCity stakeholders say disinterest in governance has intensified in recent years due to increased demands on people’s time, and it’s especially bad at the local level–even in a well-educated town like Ann Arbor.

“I think we take a lot for granted,” says CivCity board member Linh Song. “The lifestyle here can be pretty comfortable… I think a lot of folks just kind of check out and think, ‘Well, you know, Ann Arbor kind of takes care of itself. We don’t have to pay attention.’ But I’m hoping that’s changing.”

Morgan and Askins have ideas for a wide variety of programs to help effect that change, but their fledgling organization is taking it one step at a time. One of CivCity’s first projects is an online game called CivCity Quest, expanding upon the way the Chronicle “gamified” election results last summer. CivCity Quest would use the AADL’s Summer Game template to create a “playful” online competition for players to participate in various civic activities, from doing neighborhood cleanup to attending public meetings.

You can read more here.

You can find the original version of this Gov 2.0 Watch post at http://gov20watch.pepperdine.edu/2015/04/the-engagement-game.

Can Participatory Budgeting Democratize School Budgets?

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We encourage you to check out what promises to be a fascinating webinar that the Participatory Budgeting Project, an NCDD member organization, is hosting on Thursday, June 4th from 2-3pm EST / 11am-12pm PST. 

The webinar is titled PBP-logo“Democratizing Schools with Participatory Budgeting” and will be an in-depth discussion of the nation’s first school-based participatory budgeting (PB) processes, featuring representatives from PB projects at schools in San Jose, CA and Chicago, IL. The webinar will seek to use insights from these cases studies to explore the impact that democratic processes like PB can have on young people, schools, and neighborhoods.

Here’s how PBP describes the webinar:

Schools and school districts operate large and complex budgets – often with minimal participation from the community members and youth they work to serve. But it doesn’t have to be this way!

Join the Participatory Budgeting Project to learn about how participatory budgeting (PB) can encourage transparency in school budgets, reveal the most pressing needs of students, and promote democratic decisions that result in better schools and neighborhoods…

The webinar will include an in-depth look at the first school-based PB processes in the U.S., highlighting three high schools around the country that are leading the charge to lift up student and parent voice. We’ll be joined by representatives from Californians for Justice to discuss the PB process at Overfelt High School in San Jose – recently profiled in EdSource – and from Mikva Challenge and Embarc Chicago to discuss the PB process at Chicago’s Sullivan High School.

Join us to learn about these case studies and explore how participatory budgeting could work in your school or school district.

This webinar promises to be a great opportunity to hear from people directly involved in some of the most cutting edge work on participatory democracy in schools, so be sure to mark your calendars for June 4th! You can register and receive more information on the event by clicking here.

Not familiar with PB?

Participatory Budgeting is a democratic process in which ordinary community members directly decide how to spend part of the public budget. It has been used around the world for 25 years, in over 1,500 cities, to lift up the needs of communities and make public spending more equitable. You can watch a short video about PB here:

You can find the original Participatory Budgeting Project post about this webinar by visiting www.participatorybudgeting.org/blog/democratizing-schools-with-pb.

Kettering Video on “The Creation of Politics”

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We were impressed by the very cool video that the Kettering Foundation – one of NCDD’s key organizational members – recently released. It can be an easy and fun tool for introducing deliberative politics to your audiences, so we encourage you to read more about it below or find KF’s original post about it here.

kfThose of you who have participated in Kettering’s annual summer Deliberative Democracy Exchange have probably heard Kettering Foundation president David Mathews tell a story about a small village that faces a recurring flood. It is a fable of sorts. In spite of the villagers’ many efforts to stop the flood, the waters return again and again.

So the people in the story had to make a decision: should they move across the river, where another band of people already live? Should they stay in their homeland? Or, should they move to higher ground? And in coming together and making a collective decision, the people create politics.

The story is designed to be universal – one that belongs to all times, all people, all cultures. People in communities everywhere face difficult problems and must weigh the costs and benefits of potential actions and then decide how to act together. The story counters the idea that public deliberation is some kind of new technique to be used on communities and encourages a notion of democracy that is citizen-centered.

A team at the Kettering Foundation collaborated with Momentum, Inc., artist and illustrator Danijel Zezelj, and MainSail Productions to produce a new animated video, The Creation of Politics, which brings to life this archetypal flood story that imagines how politics was first created – and why.

You can find the original version of this Kettering Foundation post at http://kettering.org/blogs/new-video-creation-politics

How Stories Can Change Minds Across Difference

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We recently read an insightful piece from the Public Conversations Project, an NCDD member organization, reflecting on a recent radio show on how hard it is to change our minds, and we wanted to share it with our members. We encourage you to read the PCP post below or find the original one here.

Conversations that Open Doors: Reflecting on This American Life

PCP new logoThrough dialogue, Public Conversations Project fosters greater understanding between opposing sides of divisive issues, shifting attitudes and building relationships. This Sunday’s “This American Life” focused on a question that resonates deeply across the schisms of our polarized society: what’s the real likelihood that, on the issues you care most deeply about – be it abortion or same-sex marriage – you’re open to shifting your attitude, or even changing your mind?

The Incredible Rarity of Changing Your Mind

While we typically consider ourselves open to reason, the program reiterated a key lesson of Public Conversations’ training: we consume information mainly that reaffirms our own beliefs. Those beliefs may be inherited from our parents, our education, or our community leaders, but they emanate from our gut, an emotional core to which arguments or debates rarely appeal.

“Even when we receive information that conflicts with our worldview,” said host Ira Glass, “we tend to dig in.”

The Power of Telling Your Story

One thing with the power to counter “digging in” and maybe even change our minds? Personal narrative. The program detailed the experiences of canvassers who went to voters’ homes to discuss the contentious issues of same-sex marriage and abortion, specifically. Rather than rattle off facts or make ideological arguments, these canvassers tried something a little different: they listened, they asked questions, and they told their own story.

The conversations were honest, curious, and surprisingly intimate; one opponent of same-sex marriage asked his openly gay canvasser about when he discovered his sexual orientation. In another community, a Catholic voter spoke about her beliefs on abortion, her faith and her unconditional love for her daughters. After the canvasser revealed that she had had an abortion in the past, and spoke about the hardship of disclosing it to her family, the voter’s position on the issue shifted significantly. Her reported likelihood to vote for unrestricted abortion access started at a zero. By the end of the conversation, her level of support rose to a ten.

The transformative nature of these conversations is rooted in many of the same practices we use in dialogue: compassionate listening, asking questions to learn rather than judge, and telling your own story with sincerity. Of course, whereas the canvassers were unequivocally trying to change minds, the dialogue Public Conversations works to achieve is one that creates space for conflict to be candidly explored, without aiming for compromise or seeking to convince.

“This American Life” also opted not to inquire as to whether any canvassers’ perspectives had altered. Regardless, the story on the whole affirmed our operating principle: conversations have the power to allow for nuance, foster understanding, and shift views.

Difference: The Defining Factor

What makes meaningful shifts possible isn’t just how we talk. To be sure, specific techniques can create new pathways out of the schism of rhetoric and argument.

But it’s also who we talk to; namely, the people who are different from us. The conversation between the voter and the gay canvasser was respectful, nuanced, and open. But just as important, it happened across people with opposing views, deeply felt and clearly acknowledged differences. Among similar voters, conversations with heterosexual canvassers about same-sex marriage or about abortion with canvassers who hadn’t experienced the procedure yielded significantly less substantial changes in attitude, illuminating the revelatory combination of difference and dialogue.

Often, public calls for dialogue do create a space for very respectful, open conversation. But those conversations will inevitably be less enriching and potentially transformative if we don’t actively seek out, invite, and honor the real differences in the room.

Not only can relationships bear the sometimes thorny nature of our differences, our minds can be changed and our humanity deepened, by deeply engaging them – even if avoidance might be our natural tendency. And it’s our tendency for a reason. It involves reaching into the primal kind of scary that is vulnerability: that canvasser had to walk up to the door of someone who might slam the door in his face, and that voter opened the door to a stranger. Even without a vote at stake, even when fundamental disagreements remain after the conversation ends, as they often do, let’s not forget the transformations that can happen when two people see difference – and choose to dive in.

You can find the original version of the Public Conversations Project piece at www.publicconversations.org/blog/conversations-open-doors-reflecting-american-life#sthash.UrzqIC4q.dpuf.

Ten Pointers for More Inclusive Public Engagement

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Our friends at the Orton Family Foundation recently shared a list of 10 great tips for inclusive engagement that we wanted to share with our members. Orton’s tips come from lessons learned through their engagement work, especially with their Community Heart & Soul program – which is detailed in the full post. But the list was so good, we wanted to make sure our network saw it. Check it out below or read Orton’s full post here.

Orton LogoTop 10 Tips for Inclusive Engagement

1. There’s no such thing as the “general public”

Learn who your community is (its demographics, stakeholders, and networks) and how residents get their information. This knowledge is vital to designing effective community engagement and communication activities about your effort. Identify the key connectors who can help you reach these groups. At the same time, remember that no one person speaks for an entire group. See our Community Network Analysis Tool.

2. Keep your “promise” to community members

Be clear about how resident input will be used in your project (i.e. how much influence they will actually have). Be transparent about how residents’ input is used and what actions will result.

3. Go to the people

Change up how you gather community input. Go where people hang out, whether it’s physical gathering spaces, like a coffee shop or a brew pub, the senior center or a little league game, even online spaces.

Examples – In Damariscotta, Maine local organizers went to the town’s hugely popular annual Pumpkin Fest & Regatta, set up a booth, and used candy corn voting in jars to help with early priority setting. In the North Fork Valley, Colorado the Heart & Soul team held an event at the local brew pub and gathered people’s input on coasters—and from those coasters folks were lifting pints of Love It or Leave it Ale, brewed specially for the event!

4. Spread the word

Create a communications plan that includes project branding, messaging, and tactics for persuasively talking about your project. Use communication channels and messengers that have connections with who you are trying to reach.

Example – Victor, Idaho had a community wide Heart & Soul logo contest to help shape the brand and give it local flavor. The result: “Victor: What’s It to You?”

5. Ask for people’s personal stories

To draw in new voices, the Foundation begins Heart & Soul projects by gathering people’s stories about their town. Stories allow folks to express their experiences and opinions in their own words, without needing to understand planning or technical jargon. You’ll hear from people you wouldn’t have otherwise, and build new bridges and relationships through the process.

Example – In Biddeford, Maine story gatherers went to the local boxing ring and cigar shop, fishing areas and local diners to collect people’s stories of Biddeford. And they shared them in a public event with hundreds of folks as part of rebuilding pride in their town.

6. Understand the power dynamics

Be sensitive to parts of your population who may be uncomfortable participating (e.g. newcomers who come from a culture where participation was unsafe, people whose views have been marginalized in past community efforts). Find a safe way to talk with those groups about their concerns regarding participation and let them tell you how best to engage them.

Example – In Cortez, Colorado Heart & Soul project leaders communicated directly with the Ute Mountain Ute leadership to understand how to successfully bring information to the reservation and to listen to their concerns and advice. Through this listening and trust building, the tribe members became engaged in designing public art for the City’s southern gateway.

7. Engage in their interests

For some groups you may have to participate in something that matters to them first to make a connection.

Example – In Starksboro, Vermont our project began with cleanup activities because the first thing on peoples’ minds was to clean up the neighborhood. They weren’t talking about the future. After working together – accomplishing something – we were ready to engage in a broader conversation.

8. Think about the details

When hosting a community event, think through how you can make it more inclusive. Carefully consider the most convenient timing and location depending on whom you’re looking to engage. Provide childcare so young families can attend. Make sure to offer food. And consider transportation needs and whether a translator or facilitator could make a difference.

9. Use technology…if it’s a fit

There are many great new ways to engage people, such as online forums, cell phone voting, and social media. These tools can help make your efforts more inclusive if they are a fit with the crowd you are trying to reach. While not everyone has computer access, many more people have smart phones. But remember, good, old word of mouth and personal connections are still the best ways to get people to participate.

10. Make it fun!

When bringing people together for any meaningful discussion you are also creating the potential for a community building moment. Include lots of activities that make yours a real community event (e.g. local music and food, potlucks, poetry slams, and art exhibits).

Example – Golden, Colorado held a series of neighborhood block parties where you could have your pet checked out by a vet; get a bike tune up and a BBQ lunch while also getting project information, sharing stories and participating in a visual preference survey.

And don’t forget to celebrate your achievements with the community! It’s invaluable to mark your progress and honor your volunteers publicly.

You can find the original version of this Orton Family Foundation blog post by visiting www.orton.org/blog/top-ten-tips-inclusive-engagem.