Reaching Legitimate Decisions

What government staff person has not inwardly moaned at the thought of walking into yet another heavily publicized public meeting to face an empty room? Finally two or at most five stragglers walk in – looking timidly around for a coffee, then a way to escape.  

It seems like governments are very willing to spend money to survey, conduct opinion polls, advertize, bring in consultants, and provide options – all in an effort to fulfill their obligations to Council to “consult the public”. Someone should tell all levels of government bureaucrats that the public is tired of being fed a bland menu of predetermined alternatives with a dose of lack of respect. Governments still think they can get public buy in by rounding up representatives of stakeholder groups, showing them a power point, and asking them to put a dot on piece of paper. The leader then summarizes with the ‘where to from here’ and ‘we’ll get back to you’.

Whether it is municipal, provincial or federal - governments sometime gets blinded by its own smoke and mirrors. There is not enough grassroots engagement going on. Residents want genuine discussion and respectful deliberation with all sides sharing decision making power and responsibility. Information and process must be transparent.

Does technology hold the answer? Should we just send out information bullets with a decision piece on Facebook, e-mails and Twitter and wait for the populist vote to come in? Life, sadly, is not that simple. Not all citizens have the time or the inclination to get involved. But it is, I believe, the obligation of enlightened governments to develop regular and timely forums and processes that can educate and inform citizens, not on a predetermined decision but with the goal of getting informed opinions from our citizens.

At this point in time, I believe that public apathy demonstrated by abysmal turn out at public meetings and low voter turnout at the polls is the direct result of the inverted use of the Public Engagement Spectrum. There is far too much informing and consulting being done, top down to the people. Only true involvement, collaboration and empowerment will increase voter turnout and draw more people to public meetings. 

I look to the time when peoples’ concerns are not only heard but understood and considered. Not enough feedback is given to people on how their views impacted the decision making process to develop another alternative. Why should people take time out of their busy week to meet with strangers on an issue that is not immediately impacting their family unless they feel their views and opinions are valued and actually incorporated into the decision to the maximum extent possible?

I believe it is the responsibility of elected officials to push the use of the Public Engagement Spectrum towards involvement and collaboration and away from top down informing and one way flow of information. To do this, elected officials must spend more time at the public meetings to ensure the process is truly two way participation, must bring more discussion in front of the public and spend far more time engaging the man on the street instead of on the golf course.