I had the privilege to facilitate the core, participatory parts of the National Center for Smart Growth’s (NCSG) “Smart Growth @20” event in Annapolis. We designed the event to not only commemorate 20 years of commitment to smarter growth in the state, but more importantly to begin to set the agenda for smart growth for the…
Last week, PEA had the great honor of facilitating the National Summit for Democracy in Washington, DC, hosted by two organizations, Stand Up Ideas (SUI) and Protect Democracy (PD), committed to the defense of American norms, ideals, and institutions. The intent of the summit was to “convene an ideologically diverse group of activists and advocates…
Ensuring Inclusive Representation in Who Attends Public Meetings Proclamations are often made about the importance of diverse voices being a part of public processes. Then there is the counter retort that “We advertise public meetings, but nobody comes!” Often planners and policy-makers don’t know how to recruit diverse groups of people to public meetings, and…
Core to our belief in public engagement is that people should have the opportunity to influence the decisions that impact their lives. The fact is too many public meetings do not have any significant influence on the end result – a policy change or new plan. Good public engagement does not waste time asking citizens…