When I attend a meeting that is supposed to involve some type of "public engagement", it would be nice to have a simple checklist that I could use to rate whether that meeting really was Transparent, Participatory, and Collaborative.
This simple checklist could be the standard tool for citizens to provide feedback to government agencies about the quality of their public engagement activities. In fact, the requirement for federal department and agencies to "solicit public feedback" about their public engagement is mentioned three (3) times in President Obama's Memorandum on Transparent and Open Government.
The checklist could contain simple "Yes/No" questions, along these lines:
"Was it Transparent?"
--> At some public meetings, it is not clear what is being discussed. Even if the meeting's agenda is available, the actual proposal or other documents being discussed are not made available to the public.
[Transparent? Check "No".]
"Was it Participatory?"
--> At some public meetings, members of the public are allowed to attend, but are not given an opportunity to ask questions and comment on the proposal being discussed.
[Participatory? Check "No".]
"Was it Collaborative?"
--> Even when a public meeting allows for public *feedback* on a proposal, it may have skipped over the step for public *input* could have shaped the proposal differently.
[Collaborative? Check "No".]
Of course, different citizens can have different judgements about the very same meeting. But, just like a "customer survey", a review of the collected checklists should provide some objective evidence about the quality of public engagement.
ALSO, this standard checklist should be developed and promoted by government agencies - now - in order to gauge their current effort *before* they attempt improvements. Otherwise, they won't know - later on - if they are doing any better. (You know: it's like weighing yourself *before* the diet.)
[NOTE: The League of Women Voters (LWV) have some local chapters with an "Observer Corps" that use checklists to rate public meetings. However, different chapters have developed different formats. The LWV's experience would be helpful in creating a federal checklist for "citizen observers".]
Comments (7)
U r working under the KISS principal and I like that!
I think this is a great idea! At many local government meetings the staff outnumbers the "public". And, when the Brown Act is used, it is used to the benefit of the government agenda - not to the inclusion of the public as an equal partner in contribution and solution seeking.
Stephen, this is a good idea.
For ideas of how to compose the checklist, have a look at the posting "Ask Federal Agencies to Adopt the Core Principles for Public Engagement". If these principles are being followed, the meeting is probably on-track.
I am concerned on the potential means of dissemination of the checklist and the gathering of data after. With the imminent demise of many newspapers and the TV media becoming less and less influential, how are you planning to reach the public at large. Public meetings are much too limited.
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Nicholas,
Yes, I know about the "Principles of Public Engagement". I was on the "core team" that drafted them. However, even though I endorsed them, I do not consider them as providing more specifics to federal employees than the President's Memo already has. Basically, it's just more adjectives.
When the President says he wants federal agencies to be "more" (transparent, participatory, collaborative), federal employees just wants to know how much "more", and how do they measure "more"? That's the type of direction that will go OpenGov Directive. (I used to work with federal directive systems.)
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