Community Involvement

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Community Involvement Techniques

Community involvement among the residents and community involvement among stakeholders is an important factor in all aspects of the revitalization process. In recent years, the EPA has stressed the importance of public information and community involvement in assessing and managing potential health risks. When applying for an EPA Brownfields grant, documentation on how community involvement will be conducted is required. Although requirements may vary from state to state many state cleanup programs have developed public involvement provisions. The following are reasons why community involvement is important:
  • Identify overlooked local knowledge - Community members may have useful information about the site’s history, chemicals used, human activities, industrial activities, industrial processes and other past land uses
  • Streamline efforts – Community members may have special issues or concerns that, if incorporated into a project at the outset, may help to reduce the likelihood of challenges to risk assessment results, and potential remediation or revitalization plans
  • Gain acceptance – Community members who contribute to the revitalization planning process will better understand the process and will be more likely to support a project they had input in, thus creating a sustainable project.
Community involvement provides a forum for residents to become informed about civic affairs and actively involved in making decisions that ultimately impact their community. Meaningful community involvement is beneficial in several ways (ICMA, 2003):
  • Improves information flow
  • Improves community understanding of local government
  • Allows for community advocacy
  • Fosters collaboration
  • Minimizes conflicts
  • May promote environmental justice
Members of the community should be seen as equal partners in the dialogue that takes place during revitalization projects. Community members need to understand the details of a project to evaluate its importance, costs, and benefits. Failure to adequately inform and involve the public can cause significant delays as a result of public reluctance or outright opposition to the project. The communication process should include site-specific technical information about the project before it is implemented and should continue throughout the duration of the project. To make progress, a high level of patience and willingness to listen with an open mind are important to all stakeholders and participants in the process.
Communication and outreach to stakeholders is critical to sharing the revitalization project’s technical aspects and priorities, and to gaining community buy-in or acceptance of a project. Well-informed residents and stakeholders who understand the project's goals are more likely to support it than those who are kept in the dark or given only small amounts of information out of context. Revitalization project details such as design, images, upcoming projects, and relevant information about contamination and remediation should be shared with communities.  This can be done via public meetings,  workshops and seminars, local media announcements, open houses, the city’s website (if present), informative project display in publicly accessible places (library, post office, bank, etc.), fact sheets and flyers, or the respective state’s environmental department web site.   Specific projects may also have their own individual web sites and, if so, providing links to local web resources is prudent. It is important to note, that smaller and rural communities access to the web is not always a given. Here local media play an important role in communicating with the public. Communication is a two-way street and, as such, the direct exchange with the public is one of the most important communication aspects of a revitalization project. Only through direct exchange can concerns and misconceptions be addressed, questions answered and ideas be developed most effectively. While passive communication, like websites and media announcements are important as well, they are no substitute for the direct exchange. Good community involvement will use passive and active communication means in a well weighted manner, as an informed and engaged public can be a vast asset to a revitalization project.
The role of public relations in the revitalization of potentially contaminated sites is to translate, to intermediate between the idea and the execution, to keep the idea as the focal point of the debate, and to not allow the participants to lose sight of it (Davis, 1997). An important beginning step is to create a revitalization vision. In addition to educating the community about the project, it is useful to seek their concerns and vision of the project, and to incorporate them into the project goals. If the communication process identifies community concerns, it is important to explain when and where the specific concern may be addressed.
The following steps are suggested approaches for setting up a community involvement program:
  • Solicit individuals, especially those directly impacted by the revitalization project. Pay particular attention to the identification of groups that do not traditionally participate in the revitalization process, such as minority and low-income communities
  • Establish educational programs or a repository to access data (such as a public library), or both, so that groups or individuals can obtain timely, accurate information that enables them to have a meaningful influence in decision making. To increase readability, lengthy documents should be summarized into fact sheets and kept at the repository along with the full-length documents.  If needed, fact sheets should be customized for community groups whose primary language is not English.
  • Encourage stakeholders to define a purpose for their participation (e.g., solve problems, gain recognition) or be part of the revitalization of their community
  • Define the decision-making process early, so that potential stakeholders can decide to participate and to what degree. Make expectations clear up front to minimize problems of trust later
  • Customize materials to ensure cultural sensitivity
  • Make sure that every member of the revitalization team understands the project. It is important that communication is factually correct and consistent
  • Provide a facilitator who is sensitive and trained in dealing with cross-cultural exchanges at all formal or informal public meetings. This is especially relevant for tribes and communities with a high percentage of minorities
  • Provide timely and frequent (minimum of 2) announcements of public meetings through local media and/or flyers (an affective way to do this in smaller communities is to insert the announcement in the water bill), and identify the source where interested community members can get more information
  • Develop sponsoring and co-planning relationships with community groups, ensuring them shared roles in developing agendas, setting of goals, and providing leadership and outreach
  • Plan meetings that are accessible and accommodating. Consider holding meetings at locations that are handicapped accessible and have access to public transportation. Consideration should also be given to issues such as childcare, and language interpreters, and worker schedules
  • Have public interaction often and regularly throughout the revitalization process. Be accessible to the community outside of public meetings, and assign a project point of contact
  • Maintain clear goals by setting an agenda
  • Build upon existing social and cultural networks, such as schools, churches, and civic organizations
A good strategy for the initial community meeting is to organize it with identified community leaders. Together, the group can agree on an agenda, the venue and process for the meetings, as well as the publication means for the meeting. Fostering an atmosphere that ensures participation is an important signal to send to the rest of the community. Other meetings and follow-up reports should be scheduled frequently throughout the revitalization process. Community leaders can assist in the communication of information by:
  • Suggesting appropriate means of informing the community
  • Talking to their respective constituents
  • Announcing meetings
  • Ensuring that participation efforts reflect cultural diversity and communication differences among the ethnic groups
  • Developing notices that are concise, understandable, and available to the community/communities involved
  • Mapping the capabilities and assets of individuals, citizen associations, and local institutions
  • Building relationships and alliances to respond to the revitalization challenges
The following steps are suggested approaches for improving the public's access to information on revitalization:
  • Establish clearinghouses and repositories of information on the revitalization project, such as libraries and town halls, to allow for open access to information
  • Perform active and extensive outreach using innovative and non-traditional methods, such as school programs, presentations in public meetings, workshops/seminars, posters, advertisements in local papers, community newsletters, local cable access network stations, websites, and/or postal mailings.
  • Use of a variety of outreach methods early in the process can reach a broader group of stakeholders. Once a relationship is established, inquire about their outreach suggestions (e.g., thematic workshops, public meetings, open houses, concerted appointments of public stakeholders, local politicians, owners, and local administration of the site)
  • Making forums interesting can attract receptive participants and will entice them to come back to future meetings
  • Enlist essential participants for information campaigns, such as schools, charity organizations, local clubs/associations, civil society initiatives, and churches
  • Enlisting the help of elected officials to identify local resources that are helpful and easy to access
  • Translate the scientific and technical results to community groups into laymen’s terms so everybody understands what is going on
  • Continually assess the effectiveness of your outreach techniques by frequently asking questions, such as how did you learn about our project? What is the best way to contact you and your neighbor. Do you have a good understanding of the project?
The media is an important part of public relations responsibility, but it should be used as a tool in an overall communications program, not as an end in itself. The key to dealing with the media is to respect their roles in the process. Treat them fairly and be accessible to answer their questions. The community as well as the developer should always welcome an opportunity to impart his or her vision. In order to keep the message consistent and make it easy for reporters to get comments during the process, it is a good idea to designate one person as media spokesperson for the project. However, it is not always possible to make this designation, so therefore, it is important that all members of the project team have an understanding about the revitalization effort.
One innovative approach for a project site that has sentimental significance to the community, but is slated for demolition as part of the revitalization effort is to host a "going away" party. If a vision or overall plan is in place and the community is significantly involved, saying good-bye to the former site and welcoming the new site is a good community event.
The Urban Land Institutes' community outreach program identifies challenges to better land use and development, highlights best practices from across the country, and develops new solutions to improve land use patterns.
PlaceMatters offers civic engagement tools and techniques that are engaging, user friendly, efficient in their use of citizens' limited time and varied expertise, and able to handle complex, multidimensional problems. These techniques help bring stakeholders to the table, provide them with information, and gather their feedback.
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