As a PSG partner I have had the opportunity to talk with local government leaders around the country. One of the most vexing problems raised by elected officials and top managers is how to get people engaged in public decision-making around budgets. Most genuinely want to hear from the public, they know there is an expectation that they do so, and they know from experience that the traditional “you’all come on down and testify” just doesn’t cut it anymore. That is unless there is a hot topic on the budget agenda and then the entire process is taken over by focus on that concern.
I faced this problem when I was the elected County Executive and Chair of the Multnomah County (Portland, OR) Board of Commissioners. Here’s my story and an approach that worked for us. What I learned from it is that by putting the power in the hands of citizens and giving them an opportunity to own the process the outcomes were more useful and satisfying to all. |
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There we sat --- the county chair (me) and four county commissioners ready to take testimony on the county’s $1 billion budget. I had carefully prepared a proposed budget to address our key goals --- reducing child poverty, reducing crime, and increasing school success. Four people sat on folding chairs in the front row in a vast room in the sheriff’s building that could have held 250 people. Each one testified on the same topic --- coyotes in their backyards. What was the county going to do about that? Of course, their problem was very real to them and they deserved an answer --- but for me it was the last straw. Our method of getting public input into our budget was not working. We decided there must be a better way.
If They Hold It We Will Come
We decided that asking citizens to come to us in our buildings and respond to our format was the nub of the problem. If the budget of the county was important, then citizen groups would be willing to mobilize their constituencies to influence it. So we turned to the community and asked them to hold the budget hearings. We told some of our community’s non-profit and advocacy organizations that if they organized the hearings we would come. And I made one more promise. I would return to them and tell them how their testimony impacted my budget proposal and what I was able to fund from their recommendations and what I was not able to fund and why.
The community organizations approached the challenge of community engagement differently from a typical government. At each “hearing” food was served, childcare offered, and even entertainment provided. I am pretty sure that I attended the only budget hearing ever to start with Samoan dancing, which kicked off the Asian Pacific Islander organization hearing!
The first year, the format didn’t change much from hearing to hearing. The community groups weren’t sure that we really meant they had control and could design the events in anyway they wanted. The next year, the hearings were more diverse. One was conducted entirely in Spanish (sadly, I needed an interpreter) with over 200 people attending. One of my favorites was a high school civics class that spent time at a county health clinic, an animal shelter, and a library branch. At their hearing, they presented their findings from their site visits, information from student surveys they had conducted, and gave very personal testimonials about the services. They were concise, persuasive, and hit us in the heads and hearts.
By turning the tables and saying “if you hold it, we will come” we got valuable citizen input, created new relationships with citizen-based organizations, and the sponsoring organizations increased their credibility by putting on successful events that drew and impressed elected officials and built their mailing lists.
Contact me - bev@psg.us - with your examples of innovative ways to involve citizens in the budget process.
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