Otis White

The skills and strategies of civic leadership

When Bad Things Happen to Good Governments

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When we talk about good management, we’re really talking about two things: Doing the right things and doing them in the right way. The vast majority of management advice is about the second part, doing things in the right way.

But what about the first? How does a government know the right things to do? And what can you do if a government loses its way?

It isn’t a hypothetical question. I’ve seen governments that were lost. Many cities staggered through the 1960s and 1970s, attempting one half-hearted solution after another as their middle classes fled, downtowns declined, and businesses moved to the suburbs. It took decades to find a set of strategies for turning things around.

And today, it seems to me, it is states that are most at risk, due not so much to overwhelming problems as to divide-and-conquer politics and ideology. We’ve seen it recently in places like Kansas, North Carolina, and Wisconsin, where narrowly elected legislative majorities rammed through laws punishing labor unions or gay citizens, recklessly outsourcing public services, or cutting taxes to the point that education funding was in jeopardy.

I’ve detailed elsewhere why some states have lost their way. But a more interesting question is, what can we do now? How do you put a government back on track once its elected officials have jumped the track?

My answer: Take a page from what local governments learned about turning to the citizens. Starting in the 1980s, some cities started convening residents in open-ended discussions about what they needed and wanted, using a process known as “visioning.”

It was based on two principles. First, you ask citizens things they know from their own experiences, such as the kind of city or neighborhood they want to live in. Second, you let them talk about these things first in small groups, and then report out their ideas. The process tends to refine the ideas and ground them in reality.

Out of this process came demands for many of the things that make cities work today: walkable neighborhoods, lively downtowns, new investments in parks and trails, greater collaboration between schools and local government, transit improvements, and bike lanes. In recent years, these conversations have turned up a new concern, that urban success is depriving cities of the human diversity that fuels them.

Could such conversations be held across an entire state? And if so, who should hold them? State legislatures would hardly be the ones to ask citizens how to fix the problems they’ve played such a large role in creating.

The answer to the first question is yes, there’s no reason we can’t scale visioning to the size of a state. As for the second question, I would like to nominate a surprising convener: state political parties.

My reason is simple. Bad politics are at the heart of what ails state governments today. And the way to fix bad politics is with good politics. If one party (probably the minority party) listens to citizens in a systematic way, reports honestly what they say, and builds its legislative agenda around those desires, it will change politics for the better . . . and possibly make a majority out of the minority party. Warning: Running a dishonest visioning process, one in which you stack the meetings with partisans or report only the ideas you like, is worse than running no process at all. My advice: Trust the process.

But trust it to do what? What is it that citizens are likely to say in these meetings? Well, no one can know for sure until the meetings are held, but based on my experience at the local level, they’ll ask for things that can make their lives and communities better. Sensible things like better public schools, greater access to vocational and higher education, more transportation options, help with economic development, and amenities that might help their cities or towns hold on to their young people. For the most part, they won’t demand things that punish other citizens, satisfy extremist groups, or reward special interests.

In this way, citizens can help focus states once more on their serious work in human development, economic development, and infrastructure. This won’t thrill the ideologues. But it’ll delight the citizens.

A version of this posting appeared on the Governing website.

Photo by Josh Graciano licensed under Creative Commons.

How Citizen Engagement Could Save State Politics

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Until recent years, I did not pay much attention to state politics. My interests are local, with a particular interest in how people come together to solve problems in cities and regions.

But increasingly I’ve found myself worrying about state governments—and, in particular, their legislatures—because something troubling is happening there. The immediate problem is that we are seeing a wave of “preemption” legislation, laws aimed at forbidding cities from doing things state legislators don’t like.

Now, I am not opposed to all preemptions. If local governments habitually pass ordinances discriminating against minority groups, rewarding cronies, or favoring one form of real estate development over another, I think state governments ought to step in. (The courts usually do a good job of stopping isolated problems.) I also think state governments have a role in preventing cities, counties, school districts, and authorities from spending themselves into insolvency.

But this wave of preemptions has nothing to do with bias, corruption, favoritism, or profligacy. It’s about forbidding local governments from doing things that legislators oppose for political reasons—things like ordinances protecting gay citizens, enacting minimum wages, taxing sugary sodas, restricting fracking, or regulating the use of plastic shopping bags. The Texas legislature even considered several bills limiting cities’ ability to preserve their tree canopies.

You may or may not agree with these local decisions. But I see no reason for one level of government imposing its political judgments on another’s. Especially when the preempting government is the more distant one.

Still, if this were just about heavy-handed legislatures, I wouldn’t be as concerned as I am. We’ve had overbearing legislatures before. It’s how and why legislators are coming to these judgments that is new and ominous.

Many of the preemptions are driven by out-of-state corporations that don’t want to deal with these issues city by city. Having a state legislature ban all cities from taxing soft drinks, regulating plastic shopping bags, or imposing rules on Uber and Lyft saves lobbyists from fighting battles in dozens of city halls.

So the corporate interests are clear. Selfish, lazy, and damaging to good government, but clear.

But why would a legislature go along with these things? Why would legislators run roughshod over a sizable portion of their voters and pick a fight with a formidable group of local elected officials?

Well, in part because they can. In most cases, legislatures can extend or withdraw home rule as they wish. And in part because the benefits of doing so (contributions from out-of-state corporations) outweigh the risks (blowback from citizens, mayors, and the media). Again, the interests are clear. Venal but clear.

O.K., but why now? Why are we seeing this wave of special-interest preemptions today and not 20 years ago? And how are legislatures getting away with it? Three reasons, I think.

First is the decline of the mainstream news media, which kept a watchful eye on state legislatures in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. There simply aren’t as many reporters in statehouses today as 20 years ago. So when legislatures act in ways that benefit the few at the expense of the many, there’s a good chance no one will notice.

Second, we’ve seen the rise of organizations that marry ideology with self-interest and are aimed specifically at influencing legislatures. The most obvious is the American Legislative Exchange Council or ALEC, the right-wing organization behind many of the preemption measures and a lot of other bad ideas that have spread from state to state. (For a glimpse of how ALEC works, read this New York Times editorial.) ALEC has little-brother organizations in nearly every state now, right-wing “think tanks” supported by big corporations and ideologists, churning out dubious research and “model legislation.” (Who are the people in your city writing op-ed articles that call public transit a boondoggle and promote private-school vouchers? It’s likely someone on the payroll of one of these state-level mini-ALECs .)

Finally, some state politicians have learned to use distraction and division as a strategy. That is, they use emotional but symbolic issues (in the 1990s these were called “wedge issues”) to create smokescreens for their real interest, which is passing laws that few would support—if they knew about them.

This explains the bathroom bills, which are unadulterated acts of demagoguery. You probably remember the one in North Carolina that set off a national firestorm of protests and boycotts, resulting in the legislature’s retreat. Surely, given that experience, no other state would go down the same road, right? On the contrary. Similar bills have been introduced (and passed) in other states.

Why? Because, in truth, the North Carolina bill accomplished what it set out to do: It divided voters over symbolism while distracting them from issues of substance. The odds of a North Carolinian sharing a public restroom with a transgender person were small to begin with. The chances that any harm would come if he did were . . . zero. And yet for a year this became the dominant political issue in North Carolina—more discussed than education, transportation, water, economic development, the environment, or any other issue that might actually affect the state’s citizens.

Over the years, ALEC and its allies have gotten good at driving wedges and laying down smokescreens with constitutional amendments forbidding gay marriage, crazy concealed-carry laws (and now, laws permitting silencers!), so-called religious liberty laws, elaborate voter-suppression efforts, and other legislation aimed at riling half the citizens of a state while rallying the other half. This is politics at its worst: distracting, destructive, and dangerous. And unless we figure a way to stop the demagoguery, things will grow only worse.

But how could we do that? I have a suggestion: Let a political party begin listening to the citizens. Not in a metaphorical sense, but literally. Start holding meetings around the state asking citizens what they need and want.

In doing so, we will quickly see that, given an opportunity to think about things, citizens aren’t interested in wedge issues; they’re interested in “web issues” (to use a Bill Clinton phrase). That is, issues that nearly everyone agrees are important, that unite us rather than divide us.

I’ve seen it over and over in years of citizen engagement work at the local level. With space to think about what they truly need and want, citizens don’t ask for voter-suppression laws, handgun silencers, privatized education, or the right to chop down trees. They ask for better public schools, more transportation options, new forms of economic development, greater access to broadband, and more ways of keeping young people in cities, towns, and rural areas.

But hold on. Meetings convened by a political party? Held across an entire state? Open to any citizen? Could anything good come from such an effort?

The short answer is yes. The longer answer is . . . well, let me explain.

Why engaging citizens is right for today. The most obvious reason is because politics are so broken in our states. We need something to shock legislators back into focusing on what their citizens need and want, and not what out-of-state corporations and wealthy ideologues are willing to pay for.

And there is nothing more convincing to a politician than hearing citizen after citizen, from one end of the state to the other, asking for the same basic things from their government. Not in an angry protest or online petition. Not in a town-hall screaming match. But in calm, neutral discussions in small-town church basements, suburban school cafeterias, and neighborhood libraries.

Can it be done? And can it be done across an entire state? Yes. And yes. We do it at the local level all the time, so we don’t lack experience in holding civil, meaningful discussions about public policy or the ability to make sense of what the citizens are telling us. We lack a motivated sponsor. (If you’re interested in how to create civil conversations, start with this, then read this, then this. Oh, and know that we’ve held inclusive, polite, forward-looking, communitywide conversations for a long time . . . at least since the 1940s.)

O.K., but could we hold these discussions across an entire state? There’s no reason to think not. I’ve been involved over the years in visioning projects that convened a dozen or more meetings in different parts of a city or county. A state is larger, of course, but the principles are the same: to hear the voices of citizens, go to different parts of the state and ask essentially the same questions. (Here are some good ones: If your community could be everything you’d like it to be, what would it look like and how would it work? What would need to change? What needs to stay the same? Then ask: If the state government could help your community achieve these things, what are the most important two or three things it should do?)

But why ask a state political party to do it? Because it’s the surest way of repairing our broken state politics. Nothing focuses attention like serious competition. If one political party is convening meetings across the state asking citizens what they need while the other is cozying with special interests and engaging in demagoguery, citizens will notice. And eventually so will the leaders of both parties.

But why a political party? Why not a candidate? This gets us a little deeper in the thicket of state politics. State political parties are pretty feeble organizations. That’s because most of them don’t do much but carry out light-housekeeping election responsibilities and wait for candidates to emerge. They have neither the ambition nor the resources to do anything else.

Which strikes me as odd, given how important the labels “Democrat” and “Republican” have become in the past 30 years. Book after book and scholarly article after article have documented the rise of partisan identity in America. Some even see partisanship behind where people choose to live today. In many states, having an “R” or “D” next to your name is enough to ensure your re-election or doom you to defeat, depending on the district. No company in America has brand loyalty as great as America’s political parties.

So if you are the minority party in a one-party state, why not try to change your brand? Why not give those who would never consider voting for a Democrat a reason to see things differently? I believe having a state political party, year after year, holding civil, open, constructive conversations with voters—and publishing what it hears—could be just such a game changer.

But couldn’t a candidate do this kind of thing even better than a party? After all, plenty of politicians have begun their campaigns with “listening tours” in which they asked voters what’s on their minds. One candidate, Lawton Chiles of Florida, kept it up for his entire campaign. In 1990, Chiles asked people to tell him what was working in their communities all the way to election day. (The voters must have liked this unusual way of campaigning. They elected him governor.)

The problem is that most of the listening tours are just political tactics that are quickly dispensed with. Chiles’ efforts weren’t—he truly seemed to learn something by talking with voters—but he didn’t stick with it once he became governor. Candidate “listening tours,” then, aren’t sustainable. Nor are they systematic.

And that’s what we need: A new form of state politics based on listening to citizens in ways that are systematic and sustainable. And we can’t depend on candidates to do this. We need a permanent sponsor, an organization that sees value in engaging citizens year in and year out and is in a position to change politics.

And the only entity I can think of that fits this description is a political party.

So what would it take for a political party to take on a statewide citizen engagement process that continues indefinitely?

It takes a leader. Not a candidate or office holder (elected officials have their hands full with their own campaigns), but a donor, staff member, or party activist. Someone in a position to answer the three “P” questions of public policy: How do we manage the politics (inside the party)? How do we bring the public along (by positioning this new initiative)? And how do we pay for it (by finding donors willing to support such a bold new initiative)?

But what about publicizing and holding the meetings and making sense of what the citizens say? Isn’t this difficult? Well, it does require a talent for organization, a devotion to listening and reporting things accurately, and some skill with facilitation, but none of these is particularly hard to learn. (Trust me, I’ve learned all these things.) You can find consultants who can help, but if the party does it long enough, it will create these skill sets among its own staff.

So let me summarize: We have a way of changing the toxic nature of politics today. It has been thoroughly tested at the local level. It could change the way voters look at the two parties—to the benefit of the one bold enough to undertake such an initiative. It could bring purpose to one of our most underutilized political institution, state political parties. We need just one thing: a leader willing to fit the pieces together in her state and make it work.

This sounds good, but wait a minute. What would we do with the results of all this citizen engagement? If the Georgia Democratic Party or the California Republican Party went from city to suburb, town to country asking people what they wanted, if it made sense of what the citizens needed and wanted, if it created a report listing the top 10 (or 20) needs . . . then what?

In essence, nothing. Publish the results on a website (videos from the meetings would be nice) and send out a press release. (“Here is what the citizens of Georgia told us in 12 open-ended conversations across our state.”) Then repeat the following year.

After the first year, nothing will happen. Probably not much will happen after the second year. But about year three, the media, reformers, and your party’s leaders will start paying attention—and so will the opposition party’s leaders.

Among other things, they’ll notice that, in conversations across the state, in neighborhood libraries, suburban school cafeterias, and small-town church basements, citizens asked for the same things, over and over. They’ll also see that the citizens have big ambitions for their communities—a bigger vision than elected officials—but are realistic about the state’s role. And as these things sink in with legislators, the tide will turn.

As legislators and the news media see what the citizens really want, the demagogues will look foolish and those peddling special-interest legislation will be unmasked. Members of the party sponsoring the citizen meetings will rush in with bills responding to the citizen needs. Members of the other party will cast doubt on the meetings, but that won’t last long because the needs and wants will be so . . . obvious. And if they persist in denying the needs, that’s fine too. Because they won’t be the majority party for long.

My aim in putting this idea forward isn’t to elect more Democrats in Georgia or Republicans in California, but to change state politics. It probably would elect more Democrats to my state’s legislature because it would give voters a reason to reconsider the party. After all, it’s a great tactic. (“The Democrats listen to Georgia’s citizens, the other party listens to out-of-state interests.”)

But it’s more than that. It’s a way of reorienting politics to listening to citizens and treating them as equals in decision making. No government, state or local, should ever do things for citizens. It ought to do things with citizens. With, that is, the understanding that individuals, families, nonprofits, institutions, charities, religious organizations, and other governments have roles to play in making places better. All progress in complex societies is collaborative.

It begins with some simple questions: What do you need and want? What are you as citizens willing to do to achieve these things? What could others in your community do? And what could the state government help with?

And there’s only one group that can answer these questions: the citizens.

Postscript one: I’ve learned from long experience that one thing is essential in citizen engagement, and that is integrity. Manipulate the meetings by asking leading questions or packing the sessions with supporters, and you’ll be spotted as a fraud. You must make a sincere effort to get a cross-section of citizens to attend, and you must ask open-ended questions whose answers are recorded publicly and reported accurately.

Likewise, as you compile and analyze the comments and search for common themes, your methodology must be made clear. It has to answer this question: In combing through thousands of comments made by hundreds of citizens, how did you decide these were the things they wanted?

Trust me, the other party will criticize everything you did. So be prepared to defend everything you do. (Having videotape of the meetings will help.)

Postscript two: Small detail but big consideration. Should you let elected officials speak at these citizen meetings?

My answer: no. Elected officials (of either party) should be welcome to come, observe, and—if they wish—join the citizens as a citizen in talking about local needs. But allowing them to address the meeting would open the process to charges that the results were manipulated (see postscript one). These meetings should be about listening to the citizens. And that’s what elected officials should do in them: Stand to the side and listen attentively. They just might learn a thing or two.

A Beginner’s Guide to Facilitation

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If you’re a civic leader, chances are that you’ll have to facilitate a meeting. It could be for a community task force or an intergovernmental planning group. It might be a community visioning meeting or a nonprofit board planning retreat. However it happens, don’t be surprised to find yourself managing a group of people who are struggling toward a decision.

You know how decision making works inside an organization or within a political setting, of course. A group makes a proposal, another group might argue against it, and a third group (the boss, the board, the city council) decides.

Well, put aside that image. In the meetings I have in mind, there’s just one group, which explores the issue, discusses different solutions, and comes to a decision. If you’re the chair (or if the chair has asked you to facilitate), it’s your job to get this group through its fact-finding and discussion and to a decision.

So how do you do that?

I’ll offer some pointers below, but first let me tell you why facilitation is growing in importance: We need more collaboration. Cities are increasingly archipelagos of dispersed power, and to bridge these islands of influence, we need people who can help independent decision makers think and act together. That can be you.

Here, then, are some of the basics of structure, process, and coming to decision. Consider it a beginner’s guide to facilitation.

Structure: There are three cardinal rules: Deal with the present before the future, the outside before the inside, and the “what” before the “how.”

If you have a day-long retreat, spend the morning discussing the current situation: basically, how we came to this place and how we’re positioned to deal with the issues we face. Many strategic planning sessions start out with a SWOT analysis (which stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats). This can help participants understand the present before talking about the future.

If you do a SWOT analysis, be sure to begin with the “OT” parts, the external opportunities and threats, before the “SW,” the internal strengths and weaknesses. This will help focus participants on the issues they face and avoid getting bogged down in blame-casting.

As the discussion moves to the future, you’ll want the group to set goals before discussing strategies. This is harder than it sounds because most of us live in the “how” parts of our jobs, not the “what” parts. But if the group gets sidetracked by the details of doing, it will never focus on setting goals.

Process: The most basic thing participants want in an important meeting is to be heard. Not just listened to, but heard and acknowledged. So find ways of doing this.

When I facilitate meetings, I write down what people say on large flip charts. Others use laptops with overhead projectors. This isn’t just procedural. Recording what people say in such a visible way moves the meeting along, as people tend not to repeat themselves when their comments are on display. It also helps the group see connections among ideas, and that can help with decision making.

Coming to decision: As the group discusses the future, try framing what participants say as alternatives. As these alternatives are fleshed out, post them on a wall, adding details as the discussion moves along. At some point, it may be obvious which alternative the group prefers.

If not, you can ask the group to vote. Roll calls work, but a better way is dot voting, especially if there are a number of alternatives. You know the drill: You hand participants some colored dots and ask them to vote for the solutions they think are most viable.

Dot voting is transparent, interactive, and surprisingly enjoyable. You’ll be impressed by how seriously participants study the alternatives. And when it’s done, the group’s decision will be as plain as the dots on the wall.

The Seedbed of Civic Involvement

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Everything works better in cities with high levels of citizen involvement. Social scientists tell us that politics are kinder when more people pay attention to government and vote, and social problems are diminished when people are close to their neighbors. Quality of life improves when people support festivals and attend local concerts and shows. Cities look better if people turn out for neighborhood cleanups and park conservancy projects. And when trouble comes—a big local industry closes or a natural disaster strikes—people are far more likely to see things through when they’re involved and invested in the place they live.

If civic involvement can do all these things, then there’s really only one big question: Where do you begin? Assuming yours is not a place where people vote in high numbers, check up on their neighbors, and turn out in large numbers for cleanup projects, what can governments and civic organizations do to get it started?

Answer: They can help people find one another and get organized for any legitimate purpose: recreation, self-improvement, religious, family betterment, education. And then be patient.

This won’t satisfy impatient leaders who want people involved in high-level civic work . . .  now!  How about calling some town-hall meetings or starting a citizens commission? You can do that, and if you do it well, you might see some improvement in community involvement. But if you want deeper, long-term change—big shifts in how citizens relate to one another and to the community—you need to work on the seedbed of civic involvement, which is self-interest plus connection plus organization. Then trust that these seeds will grow into a more involved citizenry.

Why begin with the seedbed? Because most people who are leaders in their communities didn’t start out as involved citizens; they grew into the role. A few had jobs that took them into local politics or civic causes, but the vast majority came up through volunteer work. And their first experiences with volunteering were usually about things in their immediate areas of interest (family, home, recreation, etc.). Go through the biographies of your city’s elected officials and you’ll find many started out volunteering for the PTA and got drawn into school district issues, or were on a neighborhood association board and got interested in local politics, or were active in a bicycling club and got caught up in a campaign for bike lanes. Once they figured out how things worked in their community, they were hooked.

This, then, is one reason you start with the seedbed: Multiply the number of opportunities for volunteer leadership, and in time you’ll multiply the number of deeply involved civic leaders. It won’t happen quickly. And not all the seedlings will grow into city leaders; many will be happy to serve in the PTA for years, or organize neighborhood cookouts, or teach safety classes to generations of young cyclists.

And that brings us to the second reason for tending the seedbed: Just as healthy forests don’t need all trees to be tall, we don’t need only highly involved civic leaders. We need moderately involved citizens, too: People who vote, serve on PTA committees, volunteer as Scout leaders and soccer coaches, turn out for neighborhood projects, and make small donations to good causes. Just as leaders do, these people strengthen their communities.

I can see this in my own life. My mother belonged to a business women’s club that, as far as I could tell, functioned as a social organization that, on the side, gave out college scholarships. Mostly, though, it just met, listened to speakers, and socialized. The scholarships were a good thing for the community, helping a few deserving students along the way. But an even better thing may have been the connections that these women forged as they helped one another in their careers. Who knows how many of them stayed in my hometown because of this network, enriching the community’s human capital?

We’ve known about this link between social networks and healthy communities for more than a decade, since Harvard Professor Robert Putnam wrote his book “Bowling Alone.” It was a convincing look at the decline of what Putnam called “social capital,” the connections that people have with one another. Where Americans once played bridge in foursomes, bowled in leagues, and joined Kiwanis Clubs to meet other business people, we now spend time in cars commuting long distances or in front of TVs or home computers. Putnam learned that people still do bowl; they just don’t do so in leagues. Rather, most bowl alone or as couples. Without the leagues, the bridge parties, the Kiwanis Clubs, and all the other group activities, modern Americans don’t form relationships and work for common purposes as easily as they once did. And this, he warned, threatens healthy communities and democracy itself.

Putnam’s book was a brilliant but depressing analysis of the problem that didn’t give us many starting points for changing things. But a new book and a think-tank report from the U.K. do. They point us to simple ways for connecting people around shared interests, by using a few incentives and a little help.

The book is “Unanticipated Gains” by Mario Luis Small, a sociology professor at the University of Chicago. As the title suggests, it was about something surprising: the rich networks of support that some families in New York developed when their children were young.

His study focused on mothers from a variety of socioeconomic backgrounds who had children in day care centers. Parents turn to centers, of course, for economic or professional reasons: They have to work or want to work, and they need a safe, nurturing place for their children for a portion of the day. You’d think that the interactions of mothers and fathers dropping off and picking up small children would be hurried and, therefore, not great for creating connections. But some centers, Small found, had very effective ways of bringing parents together and connecting them with the city around them.

The keys were that some centers required parents to do something in addition to leaving and picking up their children: organize a field trip, serve on a parents’ advisory committee, raise money, and so on. And some were good at connecting parents with needs with resources elsewhere in the community. As a result, through these centers, some parents got a lot more than child care; they gained lifelong friends, new resources, and much closer connections with the community.

What was important, Small said, were the activities the parents were asked to do. If the work was organized by the parents themselves, which required understanding, and the interactions were repeated, which built trust, friendships grew even among parents who were not much alike. This is particularly important in multi-cultural communities where people often don’t recognize themselves in their neighbors.

And some of the centers were more than good facilitators, Small found. They were good brokers of information. That is, they could help parents find information and get help outside their neighborhoods, by showing them how to navigate the public school system, get help in domestic abuse cases, find doctors and hospitals, even get family tickets to museums and circuses.

What does this have to do with civic work? As my mother’s business women’s network did in my hometown, it made it far more likely these families would stay in New York and be successful there. It meant their children would also be more likely to succeed. And simply having a network of friends—and a stake in the city—meant for many that they would take greater ownership in and care of the community. People with friends are less likely to litter, deface property with graffiti, or ignore criminal activity. And they are more likely to vote, volunteer for good causes, and care about their neighbors.

And something else. This kind of self-interested volunteering teaches people the basics of leadership: organizing meetings, managing projects, finding resources, handling disputes, negotiating with other interests. Some will take these skills to larger venues.

With the New York day care centers, government had a hand in getting the parents connected. Centers that served low-income families and received state aid were required to have parent advisory committees. That incentive alone got some centers started in involving parents, although the smart ones went well beyond that.

Governments can’t require other forms of volunteerism, of course. All they can do is encourage and facilitate it. But that can be a powerful tool, as a report from a British think tank argues. The report is called “Clubbing Together: The Hidden Wealth of Communities,” and it argues that “casual connections” among citizens can be generated with little effort and cities can play a big role in doing so by making it easier for people to meet.

What are “casual connections?” They could be anything from people playing bingo to weekend sports leagues (think of softball leagues here, soccer there). These connections introduce people to one another, promote ethnic understanding, create “sentiments of trust, reciprocity, and purpose,” and in time “spur members into social actions, such as voluntary work or charitable giving,” the report says. In other words, they act as seedbeds.

This brings me to the great opportunity for communities. They have lots of places for people to meet, from playgrounds and softball fields to libraries and community centers. And with a little imagination, they could multiply the number of meeting places tenfold: school cafeterias, museum lobbies, concert halls, city hall meeting rooms, college classrooms, YMCAs. There are private spaces too, such as coffee shops, apartment clubhouses, and (yes!) bowling alleys that could be induced to open their doors to citizens—and potential customers—if there were property tax breaks involved. We could also make it easy for groups to find these spaces, with online reservations. (Attention, community hackathons!)

But what about security and cleanup? Organizers could sign forms assuming responsibility for hauling out trash and locking the doors. Would it work? I’ve been involved in scores of public meetings in schools, churches, and recreation centers over the years. I’ve never seen a volunteer group—even an informal one—refuse to take these responsibilities seriously.

But there’s a lesson here too. Much like mulch in a real seedbed, trust is the ingredient that enriches civic seedbeds. Yes, once in a while, you will be disappointed when a group doesn’t clean up the school cafeteria as it promised. But as you’re obsessing about the few, be sure to look about you and see all the healthy trees that are growing up.

Photo by Pictoscribe licensed under Creative Commons.

“What” Before “How”

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Many communities fight the same old battles over and over. And even when there’s something new to consider–a solution that could improve the downtown, say, or a big economic development opportunity–the city can’t seize it because everyone is squabbling about the details. How do places get stuck in such unproductive debates?

There can be many reasons, some involving deep unresolved conflicts (dealing with race and class or other social and political divisions). But a surprising number of times, the reason is simpler: The community is talking about the issue in the wrong way. Leaders have jumped into a discussion of “how” before talking thoroughly about “what.”

Confused? Bear with me. Most leaders are problem solvers by nature. Show them a problem, and they’ll work through as quickly as possible to a solution, then pour their energies into selling that solution. On one level, it’s refreshing to be around such quick thinkers. And if the leaders are extremely powerful and can bulldoze opponents (think of Mayor Daley at his zenith in Chicago), it might work. Otherwise, it’s a recipe for disaster.

Here’s a better way: Spend at least as much time talking with other leaders and the public about the problem and why it’s worth solving as you do on actual solutions. Help everyone agree on “what” (the problem and the benefits of its solution) before moving to “how” (the solution itself).

Yes, this requires quick thinkers to show some patience, but it will pay off in two ways. First, it will dampen divisions. Most of the big battles in communities are over “hows,” not “whats.” (People generally agree on the need for better mobility, just not on that road in that place. They agree on the need for city services, just not on that tax at this time.) If you start with a thorough discussion of “what” (mobility and its benefits, city services and their benefits), you make it easier later on to accept the sacrifice of the “how.” Second, spending more time with “what”–and inviting many people into that discussion–may open the door to a better “how.” In complex environments like cities, thinking about problems from many perspectives usually improves solutions.

Let’s use an example: how to help your downtown. Let’s say that you’ve been thinking about this for a long time and have decided your downtown needs a business improvement district, which allows commercial property owners to tax themselves for special improvements such as streetscaping and security. If you do what many leaders do and simply announce your solution, you open a free-fire zone. Property owners may not like it (why should they pay for additional services the city ought to provide?), citizens may be suspicious (isn’t this just privatizing our downtown?), downtown residents may object (why don’t we get a seat at the table?), and on and on. Six months from now, you may still be bogged down in the debate . . . if the idea isn’t already dead.

Why not take those six months for a discussion of what downtown could be if its biggest problems could be solved? How it could look and feel. Which new businesses or attractions could be there. How young people or older citizens might use it.

After–but only after–a vision is in place, then move to the problems standing in the way (we need streetscaping and better security) and how they could be solved. The groups you’ve assembled might quickly take up the idea of a BID, or they might choose another solution. But they’ll come to it with a far better idea of what they’re trying to solve and why it’s important, and they’ll come to it collectively. You won’t have to argue with property owners, citizens, or downtown residents about why it’s important to take a first step. They’ll be among those demanding it.

And they’ll be demanding it for the best of all possible reasons: They own the problem. They believe in the benefits of solving it. They’ve thoughtfully explored the solutions.

And they’ve done it in the right order.

This is part of a series of brief postings called Rules for Reformers. For an introduction to the series, please click here.

About Otis White

Otis White is president of Civic Strategies, Inc., a collaborative and strategic planning firm for local governments and civic organizations. He has written about cities and their leaders for more than 30 years. For more information about Otis and his work, please visit www.civic-strategies.com.

The Great Project

Otis White's multimedia book, "The Great Project," is available on Apple iTunes for reading on an iPad. The book is about how a single civic project changed a city and offers important lessons for civic leaders considering their own "great projects" . . . and for students in college planning and political science programs.

For more information about the book, please visit the iTunes Great Project page.

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