THE PLANNING & DESIGN CENTRE NEWSLETTER ISSUE 007 | JULY 2013
SO W hat EX AC T LY is
"C O M MUN I T Y EN G A G EM E NT" AND WHAT COULD IT BE? Engagement is a process of open and ongoing dialogue between the public, community groups and government from start to end. This issue is about
WAYS E NGAGE TO
EXPLO R E
We explore bright approaches to engagement around North America. These include participatory budgets, neighbourhood associations, and open data.
PART N ERSH IP
Partnering from the bottom up with neighbourhoods where real needs exist is a shared success story around North America.
RP + 5
How can the culture of community engagement be advanced as HRM moves forward? The PDC is dedicated to three simple principles:
1. Awareness. Increasing public access to information and visibility of projects and plans in Halifax. 2. Collaboration. Creating a forum that raises the quality of public discussion to overcome polarized debate. 3. Innovation. Promoting leadership and advocacy for high quality public infrastructure.
In this issue, we explore ways that other places have meaninfully engaged community members in the planning process. Community planners need support and buy-in from community in order to make plans and projects effective over the long run.
Communities need bold plans. A
plan sets the direction for the future based on a community's values. It determines where and how we should develop. The Regional Plan under review in Halifax must be developed in a way that responds to the values of the community. Now is the chance for planners and politicians to invest in collaboration with the community and
develop a plan that represents the public interest for the next 25 years. The community must be seen as an active participant in the development and implementation of the Plan. Change can be slow when there are no champions for a Plan. But places like Chicago and Seattle show how civic leaders can instigate change. In Halifax, the community is also showing leadership. Groups such as the PDC, Fusion, EAC, OurHRM Alliance, Local Business Commissions and others are mobilizing, and calling for a bolder more ambitious Vision for HRM. HRM is poised to show that community can work with HRM staff
to create a stronger Regional Plan. In all of the places we will look at, change started small: in Philadelphia it was politicians sitting down and learning from the IT community, in Seattle it was on a neighbourhood scale, in Chicago through the initiative of one alderman. There is also something to be said for leading by example. To show a radically different approach, or produce a solution, we need more bright spots of collaboration and small victories in Halifax to turn the tide and make more believe that we have the opportunity to shape our own future.
1 SEATTLE
Community engagement can
take many forms, but fundamentally it is about citizens having ownership and influence over decisions in their community. Grassroots governance and community decision-making is well established in Seattle where the city has experimented with shifting power to the neighbourhood when it comes to neighbourhood planning, civic projects, public art, and funding for projects. The Department of Neighborhoods was at the centre of this shift, empowering and connecting local community organizations and councils. A centrepiece of this shift was the goal of building community ownership of Neighborhood Planning. Local communities were participating in many city-led planning exercises but were seeing little in the way of results. Planning–specifically neighbourhood planning–had become irrelevant to anyone outside of the city's planning department. Local neighbourhoods and community groups had no ownership of these plans and as a result there was limited political and public support to implement these plans.
The Department of Neighborhoods responded by changing the approach to neighbourhood planning. The City would no longer impose neighbourhood planning on local communities. Instead the local community councils would initiate plans and define the boundary area of the neighbourhood. Also, the community would determine the focus of the plan. Plans were not limited to land use, content such as transportation; economic development, open space and culture were all open for discussion. Although plans were community-driven, the local neighbourhood association or community council was given funding to hire a professional planner to ensure technical support and capacity existed to fulfil the core requirements of the plan. The biggest change was that the local community now had an immense stake in their plan, resulting in large turnouts for community events, community led surveys and broad public support for plan implementation and community projects moving forward. Another key element of Seattle's grassroots governance is the Neighbourhood Matching Fund.
This program at its peak provided 4.5 million dollars annually to local community organizations to community projects ranging from community gardens, park improvements, public art, education, planning, and community events. For every dollar invested by the fund, local community groups raised an additional $1.60. The Neighbourhood Matching Fund and community-led approach to planning demonstrate the potential to shift power to the local level. Below, the Fremont Troll-- symbol of community ownership. After a call out for public art the public voted for the troll, and in the face of media criticism, raised money for the matching fund, and warded off nighttime vandalism with troll patrols. Photo: flickr.com/marilynmorgan
Open data and collaborative work spaces
2 PHILADELPHIA
Philadelphia is home to many kinds
of engagement efforts from the neighbourhood level to budget-setting initiatives, but it is most known for civic fusion: the blend of grassroots initiatives working with technology to make change happen fast in government. With the advent of new web tools and technologies to reach out to the public, local governments find themselves in a sea of change when it comes to public participation and citizen engagement. In Philadelphia we find innovation and challenges, where the mantra of the tech-saavy coders, entrepreneurs, and active citizens is “a better Philadelphia through technology.” In 2011, a mix of local activists and hackers in partnership with the city began to release geospatial data on a third party website dubbed “OpenDataPhilly.”
To raise brand awareness in the IT sector, OpenDataPhilly held a contest, which attracted entries such as a bike theft report and vacant land data. The city moved forward to create the position of Chief Data Officer and established a Data Governance Advisory Board. Since then, other municipalities have implemented similar open data initiatives including HRM, but none as successful as OpenDataPhilly. Indy Hall is where the idea occurred. Indy Hall is a community workplace by membership where developers, educators, entrepreneurs, IT, and designers intersect. Its cofounder, Alex Hillman says, “My belief is that if you keep helping these good guys [in City Hall] do good work, their colleagues will need to learn the value of partnering with engaged citizens.”
3 CHICAGO
PARTICIPATORY BUDGETING IN CANADA
Participatory budgeting revives the
Guelph
democratic process. Instead of the usual audience attending public input events, PB attracts a greater diversity of people. People who attend bring real issues, problems, and requests to balance the dialogue and build understanding in communities. In 2009, Chicago alderman Joe Moore sought to reconnect with constituents through participatory budgeting. Moore used PB to allocate his ward’s allotted $1 million for capital improvements. The process is now entering its fourth year, and its success is demonstrated by the tool’s spread to other cities like New York, Vallejo, and California through the participatory budgeting project.
Guelph has a strong history of neighbourhood groups. For some time they were doing participatory budgeting without realizing it. Guelph now uses the PB tool to enhance equitable spending of $250,000. They do this in real-life terms, where all benefit from hearing the stories, gaining trust and empathy for their neighbours.
HRM
On June 6th, 2013 councillor Waye Mason began a participatory budgeting process in District 7 to spend $92,000 in capital funding. Other councillors in HRM are planning how they can use PB next year.
Photo: flickr.com/Kara La Fleur
OpenDataPhilly grew from the bottom up and the site is now run by a nonprofit organization. Its portal provides access to over 175 data sets but also incentivizes people not only to access data but to transform it into projects and visualizations that could shape community. Open Data in HRM On June 12, a group of programmers, politicians, and interested people met at the HUB to discuss Open Government and Open Data in HRM. The meeting acknowledged the need for grassroots working with the top and brought together HRM representatives on Open Data (halifaxopendata. ca). This meeting was the beginning of what needs to be inevitable: sharing of data and building relationships from top to bottom.
STEPS
1. Neighbourhood meeting to introduce PB. 2. Community representatives generate proposals 3. Final round and presentation of proposals. 4. Community residents vote on spending priorities In HRM District 7: http://halifaxdistrict7.ca/ Elsewhere: www.participatorybudgeting.org/ Photo: flickr.com/loralode
Methods of Participation
INFORM
CONSULT
Government Websites and Calendars
Town Hall Style Meeting
Listed here is the range of public participation, from left to right with increasing power to the public.
Open House
In The Mail
Providing the public with information on events and developments in the city to help understand problems, opportunities, and solutions. Ex. newspaper announcements, signage, fact sheets, and print materials. Presentations and open house meetings where information is ready made for the public. Web tools include email notifications, newsletters, online calendars, facebook, and twitter. as well as open data initiatives.
in HRM
The Regional Plan identifies HRM’s 2008 Community Engagement Strategy as a “priority plan.” The strategy was a response to a lack of clarity, goals, and an HRM-wide approach to engagement. Its first principle is that “Citizen participation is recognized as an asset, is valued and encouraged.”
The strategy resulted in increased training and support to staff, a mandatory engagement checklist, and a coordinated calendar of engagement activities. Five years later, many of the goals and priorities of the strategy have shifted. The RP+5 review is an opportune time to set a positive agenda for engagement.
Public Meetings Obtaining feedback, input and helping to set priorities.
Ex. holding public meetings, town halls, or issuing surveys to the community.
It's more method
INVOLVE
COLLABORATE
EMPOWER
Meetings In A Box
Citizen Advisory Committees
Ballots
Workshops
Consensus Building
Design Thinking
Policy Roundtable
Community design-based planning
Working directly with the public to
address their aspirations, concerns, and ensure they are understood. Ex. Meetings-in-a-box are mobile and reach a wider audience. Workshops and “charrettes” can use physical models, aerial photographs and illustrations to let everyone participate. Deliberative polling provides immediate results.
than a Community Engagement is more than a method, it requries mutual understanding and a spirit of collaboration. Works with Grassroots. It involve partnerships with community organizations. Engagement is home grown. Reports back. What is learned is taken back and reported to the community to ensure they heard correctly.
Collaboration with the public in
decision making, creating alternatives, and finding solutions. It’s an ongoing process and the results are seen in the final outcomes. Advisory or steering committees place more ownership on community members. Consensus building works so that everyones’ voice is heard before the final word. Policy roundtables mean decisions are more balanced and equitable for all stakeholders involved.
Iterative process.. Engaging community is an ongoing. In community-based planning, the public is the expert and so their input is continually needed. Accessible and welcoming. Open houses, meetings, and sessions should be accommodating with respect to plain language, time, location, building accessibility, and food to make best use of citizen's discretionary time.
Places the final decision in the hands of
the public.
Ex. Community design-based planning as a way to develop new ideas and get the best from each project. It marks a commitment to change because it is designed by the community. Balloting as used in the participatory budgeting process instills democratic value in communities, engaging from the bottom-up. Design thinking emphasizes diversity of problem-solvers harnassing a designer's mindframe with a biased placed upon doing.
Neighbourhoods are experts. Ditches the mentality of expert knows best and challenges professionals to listen closely and keenly-- maybe learn something they didn't know. Creates more desirable outcomes.. Plans leave lasting imprints. Engagement is a community's opportunity to ensure a diversity of voices are heard so that the outcome is better for everyone.
WHAT'S UP? Engagement with RP+5
A New Approach
Over the next couple months HRM will adopt a new Regional Plan, triggering the next phase of the RP+5 process. The phase originally described as the Centre Plan is now being referred to as community plans. This will be the how the overarching regional plan and its policies are made tangible at the neighbourhood level. For example, community projects from parks to community centres or local building heights are defined at the neighbourhood level.
Community engagement is not intended to strip planners of their power and agency but, rather, to invite them to share the considerable task of creating a plan that will shape our community for years to come. Community support can be an invaluable tool, or resource for planners. By shifting responsibility to the local community there is greater ownership of the planning process, less skepticism and better attendance at meetings, building trust between HRM and communities.
This is a major opportunity to improve community ownership of the RP+5, building broad support for the process. RP+5 could be used as a tool to empower communities, developing neighbourhood plans that not only engage the community but are actually led by the community. Lets move RP+5 out of the backroom and into our neighbourhoods.
A collaborative approach will reduce the burden on HRM
staff to develop or manage 20-30 plans, instead the community will manage the plans allowing for a much more efficient and cost-effective approach across HRM. This will allow a large number of plans to be developed in a short period of time as opposed to taking 5-10 years to develop community plans or railroading a “community plan� through in short order.
So how could we make this work in HRM? If we were to use the North End of Halifax as an example, the first step could be to mobilize the local community to prepare for such a process. Bring together local groups including: business, residents, arts, service providers, and local community organizations to discuss the opportunity. Once buy-in exists a community planning work-group with representatives from various groups could form to lead the project in collaboration with HRM. Next the community would draft the scope and timeline for the Plan in concert with HRM, identifying any
technical needs that may require additional support. A group such as PDC could serve as a collaborator to provide technical support and to work as go- between the community and HRM. HRM could provide a small budget for the community after determining the scope of the plan. Next the community would be responsible for working through the process it has defined. This could take various forms: large community sessions, plan storefront, focus groups, surveys, project blogs but the community would be responsible for gathering information to
understand current priorities, issues and assets to determine goals and projects for the community. These goals would then be translated into maps, renderings, and policies with the help of the community work-group and a project collaborator (such as PDC). The final document would be broadly shared and understood by the local population and presented to council. Such process would reduce the burden of planning on HRM staff, while simultaneously empowering neighbourhoods throughout HRM.
Get In Touch
Also Check Out
t 902.494.3678 e info@Pdcentre.ca a 5257 Morris St, Halifax NS w pdcentre.ca
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