Q&A: How We Increase Community Engagement for Our Government Clients
5 Simple Questions for Amplify’s Principal Consultant, Christine Edwards on how she plans community engagement strategies for public sector projects.
Christine Edwards, Owner and Principal Consultant of Amplify Consulting
Photo Alvin Jacobs
Q1: Who are Amplify’s clients and how do you serve them?
A1: We work with public sector agencies at all levels of government, from local, state and federal government, to universities and Non-profits. We work specifically in focus areas related to community development and planning, transportation planning, utilities and public safety. We also help local governments increase their capacity for certain special projects.
We help our public sector clients build trust in the community with our engagement first philosophy. Public spaces should involve the public from the start. We start by talking to community members about their needs and then incorporate program goals according to their needs and expectations. This is a classic move from the IAP2 Public Participation Spectrum. Our engagement looks like, focus groups, interviews, surveys and listening sessions both virtual and in person.
Q2: What is one of the most important issues impacting communities at the local level in the next decade?
A2: I think that one of the major issues that flies under our radar is equitable transportation and mobility. Transportation planning has historically been a job for engineers and urban planners and has often left the community out of the conversation, only to be impacted upon ground breaking of the latest transit project. But we know that a growing number of urban dwellers are becoming public transit users, either out of necessity or choice and there is more political will than ever to create more and better options for people to get around town. Bus, light right, walking, biking and multi-use pathways are becoming increasingly popular in major cities. We all should have access to the same resources in our daily commute.
Q3: How do you bring people together around tough conversations?
A3: We engage people from diverse communities and provide safe venues for feedback. We encourage participants to suspend their judgement during our engagement process and always start the meetings with a set of shared agreements. Some shared agreements could include: active listening, celebrating each other’s differences, and laying out tech rules particularly in virtual events. We call on those who we don’t hear from as often. And be sure to uplift their names and put their names in the room. We listen intentionally for folks who dominate the conversation and for people who seem to be shying away from the microphone or avoiding the conversation altogether. We always leave space at the end to wrap up loose ends and determine a way forward.
Q4: How do you define success in your community engagements?
A4: I know that our community engagement has been successful when residents follow up after our events with questions about how they can stay involved or teach others what they've learned. We also love to see our clients adopt our engagement first approach. Because we win a majority of projects through the competitive bidding process, seeing public involvement in the scope of an RFP is a great indication that there is a desire to bring the community in on decision making on major projects.
Q5: How do you measure equity?
A5: We know that equity and inclusion has increases when our clients proactively include communities that are historically excluded or underrepresented in their engagements. Also, seeing long term financial investments made in changes based on the data found in these equity-focused engagements is a great indicator of success in this area. Two such projects of our have this equity focus: Equity-Focused Budget Engagement for the City of Asheville and the Equity-Focused Focus Groups for the City of Charlotte Strategic Mobility Plan.