Finding out about stuff – or not

I belong to several listserves – e-mail groups where a message sent to the list goes out to all subscribers. Some are on neighborhood themes, others on parks, environmental protection, union updates, social justice, prison reform, nursing legislation, immigrant issues, cultural events. Some of the information I post here originated in an e-mail in my inbox I found interesting.

But these listserves are by subscription only. They’re free, but you have to know what and where they are, and sign up, to receive the messages. One of the major barriers neighbors face when trying to be active in civic issues, is that we don’t know what we don’t know.

And the amount of time I spend researching many Portland issues to share with you on this blog is a little ridiculous, considering the City, County, and other agencies have staff whose job is public outreach and citizen involvement. I want to see easy access to understandable information for everyone. If a citizen knows which agency is responsible for something, it should be easy to go to that agency’s site and find out what’s happening on the topic.

Case example: I recently received a message from Chris Smith via the NeighborsWestNorthWest listserve, inviting the public to a meeting to “vision” (cough, splutter, gag) future routes for the Portland Streetcar. Chris volunteers as chair of the Citizens Advisory Committee for the Streetcar, and by posting the notice on the WNW listserve is evidently trying to reach a broader audience than just committee members. The Streetcar has come up here several times over the past week, so I thought I’d check into this meeting and see what additional background information I could find about it. The notice says:

“Get on board and join Commissioner Sam Adams for a brainstorming session to discuss the future of streetcars in Portland. In addition to learning more about the current and future plans for streetcar corridors, participants will be able to roll up their sleeves and work with friends, neighbors, City of Portland planning staff and Commissioner Sam to discuss where future streetcar corridors could occur. Information from the workshop will help the Portland Office of Transportation (PDOT) with preparations for the City of Portland Streetcar System Plan study scheduled to start in September 2007.

Saturday July 28, 2007, 9am to Noon

University Place Conference Center
310 SW Lincoln Street, Portland, OR 97201

Agenda [given in detail in original message]

But wait, there’s more! If you’d like a full Streetcar immersion experience, please consider coming to the Reconnecting America Regional (Pacific Northwest) Streetcar Workshop the day before. See the invitation postcard, or check out details at www.reconnectingamerica.org/public/workshops. ($75 cost).”

OK, so given that content, I figured CommissionerSam.com might be a good place to start. Even when I type “streetcar” into the search feature there, I can’t find anything about the meeting or planning process there. So I went to PortlandStreetcar.org, after Googling to find it’s a dot org rather than a dot com. Not obvious there, either. I don’t see a search feature there, but going to “Future Planning” then “Portland” then “Portland”, I get a Metro page “Not Found”. OK, I’ll try PortlandOnLine. Nope, not on the front page there, either. Its News & Issues & Proposed Policy link? Nada. Office of Transportation? Not seeing it, even with the Search function. I don’t even see the July 28 meeting notice on any of these sites, let alone additional information about the planning process. And these web pages are agency pages. They’re not run by volunteers who may not have had time to update them.

It’s possible the meeting is announced on the “Info” e-mail sent out from the Mayor’s Office periodically. That lists all meetings on all topics, and frankly it’s one that arrives in my mailbox and tends to be deleted unread. It’s too much information, in an unsorted format – I don’t have time to sift through it. Ditto the Office of Neighborhood Involvement E-notification service – it estimates 8 – 10 e-mails will be sent per week, with City press releases and meeting announcements. Only the most diligent and most involved citizens would sign up for that. And with both, again, you have to sign up, to receive the information. Citizens don’t know what they don’t know.

I’m using the Streetcar meeting only as an example, given the transportation discussion here this past week. This kind of thing happens in multiple other “public involvement” processes. My point is, people shouldn’t have to know they need to sign up for various notification messages, in order to find out information. Citizens should be able to find out about upcoming meetings and plans in progress, whenever they choose, by going to the relevant agency web site. Do you see how this plays in to my post a week or so ago, “This system was not designed for you”?

If you’re a citizen suddenly waking up with a burning desire to have more input into Streetcar planning (perhaps as a result of wondering about funding crosswalks and sidewalks), you have to know where to look before you can find out about the meetings. Even if you’re someone like me, pretty much a Portland civic engagement groupie, you wouldn’t know about the meeting unless you happen to be subscribed to the right listserves. You have to sign up for multiple listserves (a dozen or more of them, for me), or attend a Neighborhood Association where all the interest area committees are fully staffed with volunteers who give detailed reports each month, or it’s very difficult to find out what you’re missing. And so public meetings and citizen engagement tend to involve mostly the people who’ve been involved before – who generally support whatever’s being proposed. The question posed becomes not whether to do something, but how to do it.

I’m giving up on background research for the Streetcar meeting. What I really want to know is, when is the bus improvement vision plan workshop? I’ll let you know if I can find out anything.