Real public outreach doesn’t just listen to desires and complaints. It asks citizens to help make the hard choices, so that their answers can affect what government does. It’s what our firm has been doing for years. (1/) https://twitter.com/LiorSteinberg/status/1350823964348723200

Of course we need to listen for public comments that might help us see the government’s situation differently. But those comments won’t change math, physics, or biology, which are usually what make the situation difficult. (2/)

So outreach that is likely to have an impact, inside a particular planning process, answers this question: “Your government in this situation, facing these hard choices. What would you do in this actual situation?” (3/)

It always frustrates me when people want to shut down an idea containing X because “people don’t like X”. I always ask “Did you ask if they like Y more than X? Because the math says that without X we will get Y.” (4/)

Of course we get comments that demand bigger change that would be outside the frame of our planning project, and we are not against that. I may be doing a no-new-money plan but that doesn’t mean I don’t think their should be more money. (5/)

So we report that “outside the box” feedback and sometimes it has an impact upstairs. (6/)

In fact, sometimes the trade-off we have to present is so difficult that people start supporting more budget (or some other bigger picture change) solely to avoid the pain of having to choose. (7/)

But meanwhile, the government does have to make the hard choice, and when it’s a moral choice about competing values (as in budgeting) we respect the public by asking them to tell us what they’d do in our immediate situation. That’s what I as a planner always want to do. (8/)

Again: When we talk to the public as though they’re children, they’ll respond like children. When we talk with them as though they’re adults, at least 70% of them respond like adults, and that’s usually enough to get things done. (9/9)