☆ Reimagining public listening

The recent City Hall brouhaha over special elections v appointments for open council seats put a spotlight, for many, on the City's flawed system of citizen feedback. Why come out and speak at Council meetings if you're not heard, and if the end result is that you don't even get to vote? Former D3 CM candidate Irene Smith (Q&A nearby) advocates for a more up-to-date, professional Office of Public Listening. An Opp Now exclusive.

The current problems of community outreach stem from who and what.

Who’s missing from the community input process? Neighborhood groups, leaders who are individual contributors, small & large businesses, and residents — housed/unhoused/renters/owners. And most importantly, nearby neighbors themselves who are directly impacted by policy changes.

What’s missing is a measurement of who has been part of the reachout process and a measurement of actual changes as the direct result of the input. Many feel excluded from the outreach, and when they do participate and provide input — it can be ignored. Attending City outreach meetings becomes a circle of frustration when the community itself is not being heard. These meetings often include contrary opinions, which are easy to ignore. And there is no follow up. We are missing out on creative voices, good ideas, and possible solutions by not actively including and hearing all stakeholders.

Input alone is not success. Listening to the varied community input is only valuable and useful when the input is taken into consideration. Many outreach participants leave the meetings discouraged that their voice was heard yet set aside

How can we accept a diverse set of perspectives and act decisively on decisions? Perhaps it would be useful to put measurements in place.

1. Actively seek out all potential stakeholders and create an active list on a per project basis.

2. Measure stakeholder responses and attendance to outreach meetings.

3. Measure how much stakeholder input was utilized and implemented by the City, and provide feedback loop directly back to the stakeholders.

Once the first three steps are implemented, then I believe it would be helpful to have regularly scheduled audits of various departments that depend on community outreach. The audit should cover measurements in terms of expense in relation to goals met and achieved. Each department has goals and targets and will be easy to access if those goals have been met.

A happy City is dependent on a happy community, and that starts with communication, which must include both listening and acting on the input and suggestions of our critical stakeholders.

Proposal: I suggest that San Jose create an Office of Public Outreach that reports directly to the City Manager. It would be staffed by employees currently doing this work in their department silos. And led by a professional that has a background in business market research, so they know their job is to get opinions, not just offer the opportunity to express them.