Perfect Public Process

Let’s be clear at the outset – there is no such thing. Public process done properly can be messy, contentious, and fail to result in consensus. What works in one situation may fail miserably in another. Reasonable people can and do disagree, and can continue to do so even after the best public involvement process possible. I titled this “Perfect Public Process” for its alliteration, and to stimulate discussion, rather than to spell out a list of what must be done.

But let’s be equally clear: there is more to good public process than merely getting a bunch of people communicating with each other. It is not getting x number of people to fill out a survey or attend a meeting. It is not automatically achieved by establishing a committee of diverse stakeholders, promising to implement whatever a majority recommends, nor is it a long exercise of staff talking with citizens followed by elected officials doing what they planned to do in the first place. It is not endless talking with no tangible outcomes, nor is it a lecture to a captive audience or top-down fiat with limited opportunities for dissenting discussion. And it is not something that just happens because good people earnestly want it to.

Encouraging public participation is a profession, with a vast reference literature, an international professional association, and multiple sub-disciplines requiring extensive training and experience before practitioners become proficient. Skill in fostering community engagement requires inherent talent, learned techniques, and wisdom earned from the experience (sometimes bitter) of having tried it to see what works and what doesn’t with particular communities and participants. People don’t wake up one morning with the ability to start and finish successful public involvement processes, any more than they suddenly exhibit the capacity to do brain surgery.

Anna Griffin’s article in Sunday’s Oregonian is titled, “For Potter, success is doing by not doing”. That’s the O‘s title, not the Mayor’s. I hope he doesn’t agree with it, because it shows a fundamental lack of understanding about what public process is, what are the results of good public process, and how to get them.

A good public process requires at least three components:

1. A leader or leaders who are invested in the process as well as reaching an outcome (either a specific desired outcome, or just an objective outcome of any variety).

2. A skilled, trained group facilitator or team of facilitators invested only in the process, not in a particular outcome.

3. Participants willing to suspend disbelief and distrust enough to engage in seeking outcomes that will provide long term public benefits, even when there is disagreement on what the long term public good may be.

Occasionally, the leader can also act as facilitator. Usually, the process goes better with when those functions are separate.

Note: Anna’s article says, “The Potter approach to problem-solving goes like this: Rather than govern by mayoral dictate, bring together people from different, often opposite, sides of an issue and let them craft a solution.” I think this is how many people see “public process” in Portland. Because most people can talk, there is a tendency to assume that good public process will just happen if the right people are put in a room together to talk about a problem or goal. It doesn’t. Group leadership and process facilitation are skills that require both inherent talent and learned techniques.

Note too: Like other skills learned on-the-job by City Council members and pretty much everyone, expertise in process leadership develops over time. I wasn’t nearly as capable or effective in improving community engagement in my first term on the Planning Commission, as I was the second four years. It’s not surprising Mayor Potter hasn’t accomplished all he set out to do in his first term of office – his career and training were in giving orders and establishing law and order protocols, not group facilitation. Expecting him to be an expert in public process wasn’t realistic. What was important, and remains so, is Mayor Potter’s commitment to and desire for better community engagement. I have no doubt that if he runs for and wins another term in office, he will see many more results as tangible outcomes of the groundwork of good intentions laid since he took office. I think he would find a second term more satisfying, because both he and many other Portlanders now have new experience in civic engagement on which to build. I hope he runs again. Setting and attaining the goal of improving public participation in Portland is probably the most crucial factor in ensuring Portland’s continued success over the next decade – even with our nationally-recognized and envied Neighborhood Association system. It’s more important than changing the form of government, more important than the Budget. I believe Tom Potter will continue to recognize and seek that goal if he continues in office.

In the recent campaign to change Portland’s Charter, there was lots of discussion about whether City Commissioners have the skills to supervise bureau managers and day-to-day operations… yet none at all about whether people elected to the City Council have the training, temperament, and experience to be good leaders of public process debates. City Council candidates don’t have to have an MBA; they also don’t have to be certified mediators. Yet in my assessment, the very first necessary requirement for a good public process is a leader or leaders able to help make it happen. Not just start it, but help see it through to a successful, objective conclusion. A good leader of public process doesn’t necessarily or ideally act as the facilitator guiding participants to that conclusion, rather as the inspiration and driving force urging the team to push towards a finishing line – an endpoint which may or might not be what the leader envisioned at the start of the process. In short, a leader leads, stirring and seasoning the process occasionally rather than putting the pot on the stove and leaving the kitchen.

Clackamas County Commissioner Lynn Peterson is talking about requiring professional mediators at every county and neighborhood meeting in Clackamas County. She says facilitators are needed to reach results sooner, and so everyone sees elected officials, staff, and citizens working towards outcomes and held accountable for them. She says doing so would avoid wasting time, which will encourage citizens to attend meetings and be worth the investment in the long run. Many of Mayor Potter’s initiatives have utilized professional facilitators, which takes care of one of the key factors for process success. I don’t know whether his personal office staff, or he himself, have participated in training on community engagement, particularly in leadership of public participation processes. I’d like to see Mayor Potter run again, and take ownership of inspiring community participation targeted to reaching outcomes, as well as setting the stage for them.