AmericaSpeaks
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AmericaSpeaks is a Washington DC based non-profit organization that "engages citizens in the public decisions that impact their lives". AmericaSpeaks' work is focused on opportunities for citizens to impact decisions and those in leadership positions to make informed, lasting decisions. AmericaSpeaks develops and facilitates deliberative methods such as 21st Century Town Meeting, meetings for 500 to 5,000 participants. Carolyn Lukensmeyer is the President and Founder of AmericaSpeaks. Its partners have included regional planning groups, local, state, and national government bodies, national and international organizations. Issues have ranged from Social Security reform, the redevelopment of ground zero in New York and rebuilding New Orleans.
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[edit] History
AmericaSpeaks was founded in 1995. Since then, it has engaged over 100,000 people in over 50 large-scale forums in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.
In 1994, after more than ten years of service in the public sector, AmericaSpeaks president Carolyn Lukensmeyer had grown concerned that citizens were increasingly being shut out of public decision-making processes. Carolyn travelled the United States and held visioning meetings to conceptualize a model for large-scale citizen engagement forums, and the vision for how these forums could be used in national dialogues on key public policy issues.
AmericaSpeaks’ mission is to create innovative mechanisms through which citizens can enhance their voice in local, regional, and national governance, and to renew democracy through the development of a national infrastructure for democratic deliberation.
[edit] 21st Century Town Meeting
AmericaSpeaks’ 21st Century Town Meeting creates engaging, meaningful opportunities for citizens to participate in public decision making. This unique process updates the traditional New England town meeting to address the needs of today’s citizens, decision makers and democracy.
The 21st Century Town Meeting focuses on discussion and deliberation among citizens rather than speeches, question-and-answer sessions or panel presentations. Diverse groups of citizens participate in round-table discussions (10-12 people per table), deliberating in depth about key policy, resource allocation or planning issues. Each table discussion is supported by a trained facilitator to ensure that participants stay on task and that each table has a democratic process. Participants receive detailed, balanced background discussion guides to increase their knowledge of the issues under consideration.
Technology transforms the individual table discussions into synthesized recommendations representative of the whole room. Each table submits ideas using wireless groupware computers and each participant can vote on specific proposals with keypad polling. The entire group responds to the strongest themes generated from table discussions and votes on final recommendations to decision makers. Before the meeting ends, results from the meeting are compiled into a report, which is distributed to participants, decision makers and the news media as they leave. Decision makers actively engage in the meeting by participating in table discussions, observing the process and responding to citizen input at the end of the meeting.
The 21st Century Town Meeting marks a dramatic departure from traditional public participation methods, such as public hearings.
[edit] Notable Examples
AmericaSpeaks meetings address local, state and national decisions.
[edit] Redeveloping Ground Zero
Listening to the City was held at the Javits Center in New York City in July 2002 to involve 4500 thousand local citizens, who closely reflected the demographic diversity of the region, in the planning process for Ground Zero's future. Decision-makers from the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation and the Port Authority co-sponsored the meeting and incorporated it into their official public engagement process. A two-week online deliberation and dialogue reached another 800 New York City residents who reviewed the site options in small cyber groups.
[edit] Americans Discuss Social Security
"Americans Discuss Social Security" was a 1998 non-partisan effort funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts, that directly engaged Americans of all walks of life in a dialogue about Social Security reform and urged Congress to support legislation that reflected citizen preferences. Over fifteen months, the project engaged nearly 50,000 Americans in every state in direct discussions on Social Security reform and reached more than twelve million through the project’s media and public education efforts.
[edit] 2005 World Economic Forum
The 2005 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland featured a Global Town Hall Meeting by AmericaSpeaks’ international arm, Global Voices, where 700 world leaders prioritized and addressed some of the toughest issues facing the global community. Poverty and Equitable Globalization were voted the two top priorities.
[edit] Voices & Choices
AmericaSpeaks partnered with the Fund for Our Economic Future to organize a series of town meetings and public forums across northeast Ohio to enable thousands of people to come together to decide what to do to revitalize the region's economy.
[edit] Citizens' Health Care Working Group
AmericaSpeaks worked with the Citizens' Health Care Working Group to engage thousands of Americans in a national discussion on health care reform. 21st Century Town Meetings were held in Los Angeles and Cincinnati. Smaller forums were held in other cities throughout the nation.
[edit] Unified New Orleans Plan
AmericaSpeaks partnered with the Unified New Orleans Plan to bring together nearly 4000 New Orleanians in three large-scale public meetings to develop and review elements of a city wide-plan for recovery. Community Congress I (October 28, 2006) was held in the Morial Convention Center, and drew attendees who were 75% white, and 40% of whom had incomes above $75,000, while the pre-Katrina demographics the city were 67% African-American and only 2% of New Orleanians had incomes above $75,000. The first Congress was heavily criticized for its conclusions, which included backing a smaller footprint, and advising that funding should be concentrated on already recovering neighborhoods[1].
Community Congress II (December 2, 2006) and Community Congress III (January 20, 2007) were both held simultaneously in New Orleans and other American cities with the large numbers of Katrina evacuees (New Orleans diaspora), and better represented New Orleanians on several demographic criteria[2]. The meetings connected New Orleanians at home with friends and neighbors who have not yet made it home through the use of Internet webcast technology or closed circuit television. Unfortunately, ambiguously worded scenarios at the second Community Congress, particularly those that pertained to "areas of greatest need," (which was not adequately defined but could be construed from the hand-outs given participants to mean areas with the highest population density) caused many of the discussion results to be disregarded[3]. The Congresses were further criticized for "converting citizen 'input' into sound bites," with the result that "Difficult, longer-term issues are couched in ambiguities that help politicians save face, while video cameras zoom in on the real anguish of retirees who troop to these meetings from rickety FEMA trailers."[4]
[edit] References
- Meyers, L. (2003) ILR organizational change experts get ideas from NYC-Ground Zero town hall organizer Ithica: Cornell Chronicle.
- Rossant, J. (2005)Putting Global Concerns to a Vote BusinessWeek.com
- Warner, C. (2007) Unified N.O. Plan gaining steam New Orleans: Times Picayune.
- Krupa, M. (2006) Survey backs plan for smaller footprint New Orleans: Times Picayune
- Unified New Orleans Plan Community Congress II Preliminary Report
- Krupa, M. (2007) Neighborhood plans wind down New Orleans: Times Picayune
- Russell, J. (2007) $14 Billion New Orleans Plan May Strand Neighborhoods Bloomberg.com
[edit] Further Reading
- Brigham, S. (2006) Taking Democracy to a Regional Scale in Hamilton County. The Handbook of Large Group Methods: Creating Systemic Change in Organizations and Communities. (pp 231-245). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
- Leighninger, M. (2006). The Next Form of Democracy: How Expert Rule Is Giving Way to Shared Governance and Why Politics Will Never Be the Same. (pp 48, 66, 143-147). Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press.
- Epstein, P., Coates, P., Wray, L., Swain, D. (2006). Results that Matter: Improving Communities by Engaging Citizens, Measuring Performance, and Getting Things Done. (pp 28-29, 166-169, 200-201). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
- Nobel, P. (2005). Sixteen acres: architecture and the outrageous struggle for the future of Ground Zero. (pp 103-106). New York: Metropolitan Books, Henry Holt and Co.
