I've been an organizer all of my life, from organizing my friends as a young person through all of my professional life. But what I know and keep learning is that the real strength of community is built over time and through putting your time in. Doing the good and important work of public innovation will take time. In my current position with the City of Austin as a neighborhood planner we spend a lot of time talking about stakeholders. Who are the stakeholders? Which stakeholders do we need to invite? Which stakeholders are not represented? How do we get more stakeholders involved? One of the stakeholders that we frequently forget, but is ALWAYS at the table, is the stakeholder of time. A frequent criticism of the the neighborhood planning program is that we move too fast and don't give the stakeholders enough time to educate themselves and reflect upon or comment on a neighborhood plan. This is interesting because staff frequently hear from management that we are taking too much time and we need to speed things up, or at the least we can't slow down. We live in an accelerated society, where the concept of time is stretched and condensed. Technological innovations have changed our expectations and relationships to time and yet we still feel like there is not enough time. What a paradox!
As I do my work as a neighborhood planner, it is my intention to respect the notion of time as a stakeholder while recognizing the "time paradox" that exists. I suppose that is the best I can do and I can live with that.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
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2 comments:
I agree that time is critical. Decisionmakers usually want things to be sped up but it takes time for information to filter down to stakeholders and then time to digest that information and chew on it. It then takes time for information to filter back up to decisionmakers and other departments. Unfortunately, things get lost in translation and it is important to have more than one public hearing or reading so that people have a chance to hear what the public voice is, especially if something gets left out the first time or is miscontrued or not understood in context. If what people say is not documented and/or seriously listened to and considered then it falls between the cracks and people get very frustrated and feel like they are not being listened to or that a decision has already been made. Back to decision makers wanting to make a quick decision, when this happens there is a strong chance that it won't necessarily be an informed decision and little research is able to be done before a decision is made. It is better to hear many voices and do outreach to the public in order find consensus/common goals. If this is not done, then a decision may not end up being a "win-win" but a "win-lose." Then the public feels like it wasted its time and things fester and come back again--the same fight is resurrected. Besides time, endurance is needed. People don't realize how many times they have to tell the same thing to many people/officials/staff. And there are obstacles all along the way. And the process is often limited. It is not geared for dialogue and problem-solving, at least not Council meetings/hearings. Forums can be setup to allow for that but you often have to convince people to allow for that.
that's so true! for sure.
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