Community Process for Heart and Soul
Heart and Soul
Q - Do you call it Heart and Soul during the process?
A - Depends on the audience/person - may be too touchy feely for some, but you can still talk about the issues without calling it Heart and Soul but getting the point across.
In Colorado - the big question people are asking are: Is it commodity over community?
Trends - impact of globalization, wealthy people coming in only as investment opportunities, second homes are 40%, 15,000 so homes, real estate appreciates between 30-40% per year, traditional boom and bust economy - bankers say that the difference is that people are paying cash and not financing. Different economy from newcomers - but they are choosing the area because “small town character” and “sense of community.”
Vision 2030 update of 1994 report - 3 year project - series of 5 meetings to start - update recommendations - gather data, scenario planning, develop recommendations - celebrate recommendations.
MEETING #1 - Discovering the Heart and Soul: What are the aspects of the community that are most important to us?
Each table will go through a series of questions, at Dinner the question will be what is your favorite Yampa memory? Two series of roundtable questions that ask questions and then they will do a dot exercise.
Bend, Oregon - similar issues - just finished visioning process - have 62 lead partners (community organizations) who are taking part in implementation of the vision. Many folks motivated to become involved in community even if they are new - they articulate what is most important very well. They choose to move to the area for specific reasons and can articulate them sometimes more clearly than “old timers”.
This is happening all over U.S. - people are moving back to smaller communities for 3 reasons:
Safe place, small town feel, and affordable housing.
This is both a problem and opportunity. This causes rising housing prices, but bringing money, resources. How do you get them engaged?
Need to articulate the culture of the community.
Michelle Long example: marketing campaign idea - buy local, hire local - teaches new comers to appreciate the local people and culture through marketing.
Are we asking the right questions that get us closer to getting at “Heart and Soul”?
What would you describe as the most important characteristics, people, places or aspects of…?
It's valuable to have the tables to answer different topics. Also offer different media- different ways to answer the questions or provide input other than discussion. Dot mapping with stars identifies locations on the map.
Lebanon - Civics class took pictures and asked which ones are important to you:
Randy - NC examples. Identify the Gathering spots - they are the Heart and Soul.
Key question:
What to you most value about XX county? Answers are usually the things that they most value could be a place or a qualitative attribute such as trust, values, etc.
Also ask: What can you not afford to loose? If x were gone, it would be a detriment to the community.
Maybe the issues are regional - affordable housing and transportation - should recognize them that they are regional and ask who they should talk to.
“Appreciative Inquiry” - trained 30 people in appreciative inquiry and had it online.
Bliss Bruen: 12 Key questions: What has been a high point experience that has made you proud to live here? Who participated in that experience? Tell us about…
It is helpful to have independent funding rather than traditional town/county funding.
Is there another word besides plan that we can use? Strategic Direction, Vision.
Large public gatherings can be sometimes a free for all. Need to decide what you want out of the meeting. Want to know what is important.
Easy to start with the locations - what is important? What are the places you love? What are the greatest risks to these places? What do we fear will happen? Then talk about values - then can get to the heart of what they care about and can figure out where people stand.
Steven Ames: Regional dialogue for 1 day - presentation, motivational speakers, and breakout groups.
Two questions in breakout groups
Trends and vision will be the focus of the sessions.
Good vision question: imagine the river gorge in 20 years time - how does it meet your highest expectations. What does it look like? Tell us what you see (visual).
Are dots good methods? Do people migrate to where the most dots are?
Challenge - short time frame…
Study Circles–can be as elaborate or low tech as you want–topics, times, meetings, etc. 3-5 meetings for 3 hours each can go topical focus areas, doing a visioning process on a 2 lane road within the community–thought being to personally invite people in–train people to lead the study circles in homes, with friends and more–take all of the study circles need a good volunteer base and with networked people–follow-up with Portsmouth NH did this–4-5 very broad questions used to frame the discussion–what do you value-14-15 groups of 10people each–after a generalized kick off meeting each of the groups did 4-5 weeks of intense work. Outcomes, affordable housing, economic mix, awareness of how the community was changing–sustainability element - natural steps level–growing on its own–members of the school board got involved–study circles being used to resolve issues, report out.
DIY toolkit - focus Bend Oregon - download toolkit and do it yourself - all citizens had access to download this and organize the group for in house vision sessions.
The Pinal County (AZ) comprehensive plan - has formal visioning process -“Vision in a Box” everything you need to do your own visioning process.
Study circles help to define community values - identify the things that are important to the community and bring up important things to refine. Study circles began after race riots - safe place to talk about important issues. Need to be small group 6-8 people. Go to clubs (garden, lions, etc) and ask people to sponsor groups - need to have a diverse group.
Need to answer - why are you here? If there is a diverse group, it helps to facilitate discussion across the cross section. Deliberative democracy - Toronto
Example - Hartford, CT Phone calls from class “gentrification of Hartford” asked random sample questions about Hartford - allow you to identify characteristics of why people stay in Hartford.
Q - have any of these techniques worked for the disengaged and low-income communities?
A - Need to find the “influencers” in that neighborhood on the corner, coffee shop, Laundromat, etc. Who are the silent leaders - can't do it on a larger basis at first. Need to see if you can get the silent influencers involved. Teachers know families in communities - one resource to tap.
Another example - Tap into the kids: issue was low voter turn out. Kids decided to sign up voters - they went to the places that they knew people were going to be - the dump on Saturday. The kids were allowed to register voters at the dump. Raised % of voters a tremendous percent.
Another example - Hispanic population in community: Find out who the most important neighborhood/town people in town are - not elected officials, but those folks who were the influencers. Go to into the community and speak to them personally, in Spanish, stay away from city hall and focus groups. Make sure to keep them involved in the process - in Spanish located in community.
Good websites:
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