How do we build community pwer and trust in an unconscious world through planning.
Consciousness:
How do we bolster those who are bright lights of conscious in a community (people) that are in the community and how do we build trust among those who are unconscious so those who are conscious can get more done.
Government is afraid of people-destructive for governments own ends, wanting to keep people unconscious Difference in how things seem to be in VT…Vermont process tries to involve people trying to drag in people that are unconscious….our community is built on “you”.
How do we build trust?
James Kent - planning through sociological, finding the gatekeepers of a community, using the informal processes that happens over coffee in the morning through the locals that are respected in the community..no official capacity, but strongly influential in the community…talk to them.
Talking to rotary isn't quite it–thats talking at them, not to/with them.
Developing trust by using informal processes.
Collectively all the ideas will be right.
New communities that don't have places identified…makes this harder.
Disasters are sometimes the best thing to happen to planning-getting people to respond, even through the negative aspects lets you identify those community communicators-shows who can be motivated to consciousness, to be involved.
How do we infiltrate the informal networks? You got to find the movers and shakers..how do you draw them out of their minivans? Community participation kills them..how do we access them?
Movers and shakers should be planners…is this too hierarchical? Movers and shakers are local people that talk a lot and have social capital connections and share opinions on what's happening.
Movers and shakers can be the people who had gotten us into this mess..how do we involve the people who don't know that we have been planning for them?
People build roles on boards (left brain) based on federal or state obligations, not on the right brain heart and soul type planning-away from obligatory and to what matters to people. What has stopped collaboration in small towns is each school hospital senor center has separate boards that aren't talking to each other and having separate enclaves…can we convene opportunities to get different constituencies to talk to each other. The laws should be a reflection of us, rather than we being a reflection of the laws.
Old paradigms are not working. Vermont's town meetings are about community forum and process..and this isn't working anymore. no one has the time to sit down for a day long meeting. Trying to do this online-can this work? To a limited extent. works for those who have time and tech skills. An inventory of communication types helps.
Government is for people who show up…and people get the government that they deserve.
We are so hemmed in by the ancient statutory framework we inherited and to fixate and do it so well…and its just not working and is mindnumbing and doesn't engage new people.
Get planners into barber shops, coffee shops–facilitate within the informal gathering places…explain on one on one.
Public officials have to be willing to let themselves be accessible is less formal environments. Hard to break out off.
Town needs to market and recruit people.
Needs good thought out survey at polling stations…give people an opportunity to speak out about the important issues.
Passive-through tax bills, at voting place, already active people-as many opportunities as possible?
Visual survey used in planning in AK…we took a whole series of pictures of different buildings, commercial, like a tree lined street and a non tree lined street and asked people in 10-12 different places including schools, supermarket, chamber, board of Realtors..asked them to put stickers on things they liked.
Got them to think about what they liked…and if you do nothing what's going to happen…in an accessible, non-planning way. In Lebanon they did it at polling stations-12 different photographs of important natural areas of community and did same thing, ranking them in order. Over 1000 responses, built this into open space plan. (DONE THROUGH A HIGH SCHOOL CLASS–A CIVICS or environmental plan)
Can planners think about building passion as part of the technical process at the beginning (conscious) of project..engaging new groups.
Boarderlands project in CT/RI (Ortan Family sponsored)
One town from Danielson, CT and one town from RI-heart and soul planning-village innovative pilot..Exeter RI (rural town) they need to create village in a 17,000 people, distressed mill town, in decline with 7 village center need to bring in all sorts of new planning process in the next 18 months.
What about a town that doesn't have identity or has lost identity due to community?
Alienation of people when they lived in named subdivisions (Sherwood Forest, Woods Glen) and not seeing identity with community-the town name.
Neighborhood based planning doesn't work.
Provocative questions in informal settings..how would this (gas at $10 a gal) affect you? Scenarios doe them to think about what they would do. would this reach unconscious people (shock therapy).
Start questions: where should trash go…rather than starting from negative (plans for waste plant).
What do you most want to protect (heart and soul question) in forums…lots of marketing to focus on this question..what do you most want to value?
Emotional balance-anger can get them involved. Neutral convening can work, can be successful with well crafted questions.
Can you get a socio economic cross section involved in this process?
The smaller group with more economic power who are more articulate or educated are likely to be involved.
Outcomes money and time-people who are not engaged in community cos their own realities are too stressful..can pull them in in first phase. need to build community over long period of time. multi pronged approach and varied communication styles. hard to tell people what they should be interested in.
Character statement of community: what the residents say they are. we can never be fully inclusive. the community really represents those who get up, who call, etc. the text described what this grouping of people stand for.
This is why we are living here, this is what we want to sustain as residents..the planning needs to be built in response to that. in the example of Jackson Hole but thought, it doesn't involved the working class sector, cos they aren't living there cos they can't afford it…so it's still lacking.
Moving out of unconsciousness starts with getting people to articulate what matters to them. If the family with members in prison they may say their immediate needs are going to be higher…putting food on the table rather than aesthetic issues.
Common issues, common positions…how to you draw competing interests together?
Chelsea Vermont-how do we use land question-they visited the community Paul Kostello does this visit type-gets people out to respond…'theres a thing at town hall' so people came. had broad set of issues that got narrowed down…asked how they pick it up with the formal planing process…wish they had the planning board involved from the start. have them be conscious as the planning body and meet after to talk about how to set he formal planning agenda. third piece of the puzzle..things going on in the community. local food driven/harvest festival..this may be creating culture out of interest…social capital builders. clinical observation: formula…planning office could sponsor: IF YOU TRY AND FIGURE OUT how to tease out those who wan to see something happen, AND community visit/type of visioning setting and you agree to couple that with the formal planning process. Good shot at getting somewhere. People in his town are waking up..there's a town here again.
Creativity economy-rural development VT online-process one style, having planning people involved in other processes.
Inventory of skill sets-having some sense of what that is.
Having the community being more self aware as an underlying goal. Emphasize bigger calendar…of how these things fit and and where these things are going.
Maybe the municipal planner needs to take time out of the technical side, and get involved in the community discussion and facilitation.
Key to good process conversations are that people already know and trust each other. Planners should be involved in the social capital building cos, the more people are interacting where they already want to (party, barn raising, baseball game). THE more they will be willing to get involved in the technical side.
Anything that someone wants to add, do so here, either from the perspective of one of the live participants, or from someone that just wanders here later…