DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNITY & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

OFFICE OF THE DIRECTOR

CITY COUNCIL TRANSMIITAL

MAYOR

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2 eritt, Chief of Staff

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TO: Salt Lake City Council Charlie Luke, Chair

DATE: December 12, 2014

FROM: Mary DeLaMare-Schaefer, Acting CED Director

DIGITAL SIGNATIJRE

SUBJECT: Civic Engagement Report and Six Month Action Plan

STAFF CONTACT:

COUNCIL SPONSOR:

DOCUMENT 1YPE:

Nole Walkingshaw, Manager of Institutional Engagement 801-535-7128, nole.walkingshaw@slcgov.com

Robyn Stanczyk, Community Manager 801-535-6290, robyn.stanczyk@slcgov.com

Exempt

Briefing - Information only

RECOMMENDATION: No action necessary

BACKGROUND/DISCUSSION:

The Civic Engagement (CE) Team has completed their initial exploratory work to understand existing conditions in the organization - ways in which departments are involving the public in their decisions; determine the tools available and how people are using them in their work; and identify how best the CE Team can be utilized to build capacity and involve the public (stakeholders) in our work in meaningful ways.

451 SOUTH STATE STREET. ROOM 404 P.O. BOX 145486, SALT LAKE CI TY. UTAH 8411 4-5486

WWW.SLCGOV.COM/CED

T EL 801-535-6230 FAX 801-535-6005

The attached “Discovery Report” outlines the team’s findings and identifies critical next steps. Also attached is the Civic Engagement Team Six Month Action Plan for deploying the next steps to help city staff and officials work in ways that demonstrate and build the partnership between intern and external stakeholders, toward our vision of authentic engagement.

Civic Engagement in Salt Lake City Discovery Report

October 2014 Prepared by the Civic Engagement Team: Janet Frasier, Civic Engagement Manager Nole Walkingshaw, Manager of Institutional Engagement Robyn Stanczyk, Community Manager

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Table of Contents I. Executive Summary .................................................................................................................................... 3 II. The Exploratory Process…………………..………………………………………………………………………4 III. Baselines for the City’s Engagement Practices ................................................................................. 5 IV. Civic Engagement Team’s Mission and Role ..................................................................................... 7 V. Civic Engagement Internal Survey: What we Heard ...................................................................... 8 VI. Overall Observations and Recommendations for Investment ................................................. 11 GUIDING PRINCIPLES AND CIVIC ENGAGEMENT TOOLS A. Principles and Guiding Documents…………………………………….…………………………....11 B. Tracking Engagement Activities ................................................................................................ 14 C. Civic Engagement Tools. ............................................................................................................... 15 ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND TRAINING A. Communications ............................................................................................................................. 19 B. Roles…………………...…………………………………………………………………………………………21 C. Customer Service…………………………………………………………………………………………...21 D. Community Capacity Building..………………………………………………………………………22 VII. Next Steps ..................................................................................................................................................... 24

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I. Executive Summary The purpose of this report is to:

• Define “civic engagement” within Salt Lake City government. • Identify the best deployment of the Civic Engagement Team in order to fully realize the expectations for public involvement within the city’s work and community. • Draw attention to some key areas of investment in order to facilitate engagement and a more meaningful city-to-stakeholder relationship. • Lay the groundwork for a dialogue about how best to measure improvement, or improved capacity, over the next year of work. This report is not a list of ideas for engagement activities. There are many ideas, but as the initial exploratory work conducted by the newly-established team draws to a close, the next critical step is to clarify and launch the engagement objectives and outcomes against which good ideas can be evaluated, prioritized, realized and measured moving forward. The report is organized as follows: • Review of the process • Baselines for Salt Lake City’s Engagement Practices • The Civic Engagement Team Mission and Role • Report on the Internal CE Survey • Observations and 20 Recommendations for Investment • Next Steps

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II. The Exploratory Process After six weeks of preliminary start-up in Spring 2014, the Civic Engagement (CE) Team launched a series of activities that comprised a six-month Discovery Tour. The purpose of the exploratory work was to: • Understand the existing conditions - ways in which city departments deploy strategies, conduct activities, and approach public involvement in decision-making. • Determine the current tools available and how they are being used. • Identify ways the CE Team can be best utilized to build staff capacity to improve public involvement in our city. The Discovery Tour included: A. Civic Engagement Survey distributed online to department directors, division managers, and staff managing projects that include public engagement. The purpose of the survey was to solicit input toward the definition of civic engagement for our city and our work. B. Scan of the “Engagement Universe” — Using the power of college interns, we set out to capture the many and varied points of engagement within our city. Over time, we hope to identify where we can measure engagement efforts, and where we can evaluate our capacity- building efforts. C. Diving into a few Projects — We have been working with city staff on projects in order to build relationships, understand staff roles and responsibilities, and develop a more intimate understanding of how things work within our organization. D. Testing of preliminary “Engagement Planner” templates as part of project work. We have been called in on a wide range of meetings and discussions to add perspective, ask probing questions, and provide feedback to help staff organize or establish a framework for involving the public in their project or activity. We have started to review copy, messages, graphic layout, etc. within the framework of, “Is this involving the public in authentic ways?” As well as change management communication practices. The Discovery Tour has resulted in our identification of operating assumptions for engagement work within our city. These assumptions serve as the baseline for Salt Lake City’s engagement practices.

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III. Baseline for Salt Lake City’s Engagement Practices The future work of the CE Team will be set within the following operating assumptions and context: A. It is a high priority of the Mayor and City Council that we involve the public in our work in meaningful ways. Our organizational values are that we serve and collaborate with our community. B. We are in a time of unprecedented growth and change in our city and there is an intense need to ensure that we involve people who aren’t yet part of our public process. C. City leaders desire confidence that public involvement and input is truly representative of the impacted community, not simply the voice of a few. There is an expectation that staff need to work harder, and in different ways, to draw unheard and unrepresented voices into our discussions and decision-making processes. Our challenge is that we work within a complex way of doing business that is difficult for most stakeholders to understand. Some of this complexity is inherent in government, because we work for the public and are stewards of their money and trust. However, some of the complexity is not necessary. Complexity slows down agility and makes it difficult for stakeholders to be aware of and track issues that impact them, and to know how to get involved. - A few people with the highest levels of motivation can or will devote the time to learn parts of, get involved, and whole-heartedly participate in the system. - Some people find high motivation for one particular issue or situation, but they don’t always have the depth of knowledge or context to be patient or considerate. - Most people don’t have the capacity (for a variety of reasons) to learn how government works or how they can be a part of decisions impacting them. While leadership strives to involve the breadth of the impacted public, and desires confidence that the recommendations presented by staff are representative of the impacted public, there appears to be uncertainty that what we hear is not representative. This seems to put the organization into a continual loop of seeking feedback. There is also uncertainty about how to get enough input to reach a desired level of confidence. In other words, when will we know we are finished and ready to make a decision?

The CE Team resides in the gap between the leadership priority for meaningful stakeholder involvement in our work and the barriers of actually doing so.

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The Team has been created to address this situation; to work with all staff and departments to build capacity; and, to lead the city decision-makers to a greater level of confidence, including implementing workable processes and tools that can be evaluated and adapted over time.

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IV. Mission of the Civic Engagement Team: To build capacity of staff through tewardship of city values and cultivation of best practices to achieve our vision for an engaged city – together. The CE Team’s Role is to:

• Help city staff and officials identify and eliminate unnecessary complexity and bureaucracy in our work. • Develop best practices for city staff to deploy, as a standard practice, that help stakeholders navigate our complex system. • Identify and deploy tools that facilitate better involvement and dialogue, as well as establish a consistent city-to-stakeholder communications relationship. • Oversee training and development to build capacity for communicating in ways that build understanding and facilitate involvement. • Challenge the status quo internally. Break down silos to help staff learn new ways of working that meet our engagement goals vs. the way it’s always been done. • Approach our internal and external stakeholders with consistency, continuity, and

compassion.

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V. Report on the Civic Engagement Internal Survey: What We Heard In July and August, we conducted an internal survey to solicit input toward the definition of civic engagement for our city and our work. The survey was distributed online to all department heads, division managers, and staff managing project, programs or teams of people involved in public engagement. We had 92 responses from 11 offices: Mayor, City Council, City Attorney, IMS, Human Resources, CED, Public Services, Public Utilities, Airports and Police. Notable Observations: City department heads and project managers are aware that a good part of their audience is internal. Over 50% of respondents consider their job to serve both an internal and external audience. In total, 65% of the respondents stated that their audience either consists entirely of, or includes, an internal audience.

Authentic engagement begins with how we involve, communicate, and apply our values when we work internally. We must model best practices internally in order to effectively serve and collaborate with our external stakeholders.

A. The survey asked respondents to select up to five statements that best express what citizen engagement means to them. The definitions or expressions of engagement most relevant to the respondents are: • We actively seek public input to shape or refine our ideas and/or work. (73%) • City leaders and employees provide opportunities for public input on our ideas and/or our work. (61%) • People are treated well when they interact with city employees (49%) • The public understands how government works and how they can get involved in

decision-making and change. (47%)* • City leaders/staff strive to give voice to marginalized communities within our city (42%) The CE Team prefers the primary definition or outcome that measures the public’s understanding* vs. simply the internal efforts of the staff. It is interesting that the staff response, while inclusive of the public’s understanding, is currently measuring engagement by our work (“we actively seek public input” and “we provide opportunities”) vs. the impact it has on the public. The takeaway is that much transformative work will need to be done by the CE Team to bring the mindset of the public (the audience) into the planning.

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We must clarify the definition of engagement as being the way the public understands, acts, and is empowered to participate, vs. a series of staff (or contractor) activities. B. One of the objectives of the Internal Survey was to evaluate the awareness and adoption of the Public Engagement Guide, created in 2012. The survey asked participants to rate their capacity on strategies articulated in the Guide (although the survey did not identify that these things were from the Guide). Respondents were asked to self-report from “Strong in this” to “Doing fairly well” to “We

attempt” to “Not doing this” for the 13 individual steps outlined in the Guide. 1. The areas of greatest self-reported capacity are: • We truly listen to feedback and input from the public. (2.98 out of 4.0) • We are able to determine which projects need public engagement. (2.85) • We provide advance notice of opportunities for input (2.80) • We have a clear definition of who is responsible for public engagement with our group/department or on projects (2.76) 2. The areas of least self-reported capacity are: • We design a public engagement strategy for each project/decision (2.37) • Project decisions, and public engagement plans are “debriefed” internally. (2.36) It is worth noting that on these last two, almost 50% of the respondents reported that they “attempt” or are “not doing this.” This means staff do not identify themselves as developing individual strategies, and they identify “debrief” as the area of greatest weakness. Participants were asked “Are you familiar with SLC’s Public Engagement Guide?” Only 33% of the respondents stated that they were familiar with the guide. Of the participants who indicated they were familiar with the guide, responses to the follow up question “How are you currently using the Public Engagement Guide in your work?” indicated that only half of the one-third aware of it actually use it as a reference. This indicates that, while the principles are sound, the delivery has not had great impact on staff work and practices. The Public Engagement Guide has not been internalized or adopted by the staff. There are anecdotal reactions to the quality of information, attractiveness of design, or usefulness of the guide, which may be a deterrent, but awareness and application is probably the greatest barrier.

We must put effort into training and engaging staff with the principles outlined in the Public Engagement Guide.

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C. Survey participants were asked to share an example of “engagement success” within their work (at the division, department or city level). Responses indicate that we must provide a regular, consistent way to recognize, acknowledge and share learning from department work. The complete survey results are available on the City’s Survey Monkey account. Please contact Robyn Stanczyk for assistance or to retrieve specific survey data.

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VI. Overall Observations The following section is comprised of observations made of the current engagement conditions within city government, some of the key assets that are in place, and 20 recommendations for moving forward to build capacity and best practices for engagement. GUIDING PRINCIPLES and CIVIC ENGAGEMENTS TOOLS A. PRINCIPLES AND EXISTING DOCUMENTS In 2009, the Mayor and City Council adopted the Salt Lake City Policy on Open Government, establishing Engagement Principles and Guiding Documents, which are currently in place. An open government consistently follows these basic Engagement Principles:

• Provides the public and its employees easy access to information that educates and informs • Listens to all the people affected by its actions. No person or group affected by the city’s actions has a greater right to be heard than anyone else. • Sees the public and city employees as sources of creative ideas and effective solutions. • Follows its states processes, is truthful and welcomes accountability. • Officials disclose their conflicts of interest to the public. Guiding Documents: • “How We Do Business” - open government values • Engagement Guide – things to consider when planning for public engagement • Brand and Identity Style Guide -- developed by Penna Powers Brian Haynes RECOMMENDATIONS:

1. Create a training program for engagement capacity. a. Develop a systematic way for directors, managers, team leaders to integrate these tools into the day-to-day work of staff and projects.

OBSERVATION: These documents exist, but the use and adoption of them is limited and sporadic. We must commit to applying and internalizing the principles already communicated and identified. Based upon real-world training, application, trial, and evaluation of the results, we can continue to refine the principles as we build capacity.

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b. Train and evaluate on the qualitative skills required to implement meaningful involvement. c. Develop tools to help supervisors measure growth in capacity both on the skills required to facilitate meaningful involvement as well as measure the affects on the decision-making process. 2. Establish best practice standards to facilitate engagement. a. Invest in a planning process that frames the project from an engagement perspective at the onset. b. Develop a City Voice and administrative communications style that facilitates the principles of engagement. c. Train practitioners at all levels how to be adept in the City Voice. d. Establish best practices on all tools; train and mentor staff to use tools in ways that maximize engagement opportunities: less words, inclusive language, navigation. e. Develop visual resources so that images and graphics can be readily used to tell the stories of change, engagement, and transformation; train staff on development and usage of visual and graphic resources. f. Invest in language translation resources so that individual pieces and programs can be developed in specific languages, as appropriate. 3. Intentionally create a community of engagement practitioners within the

organization. a. Conduct internal training for all staff involved in public engagement activities. This could be included in the “Giving and Receiving Feedback” program (see “Next Steps”). b. Create a visible web presence to create connections within the “community of engagement practitioners” within city staff. Make resources like the Public Engagement Guide and Engagement Planner Templates available on that site. c. Develop internal case studies as part of project debriefs (Public Engagement Guide, Step 13). Share case studies throughout the “community” virtually, through conversation sessions, field trips, etc. d. Ensure that all new hires who have planning, project management and public involvement in their scope of work are trained and oriented to the community of practitioners within their first 30 days of employment. e. Determine how to integrate the city’s guidelines and best practices into consulting agreements for contracted work that includes public involvement. Acknowledge that they are tasked with doing work within the city’s engagement universe. Invest in regular contractors to ensure they are versed in the “city way” of engagement and city-to-stakeholder relationships.

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4. Clarify the Definition of Engagement. a. Civic Engagement is not what we do. There is not a blanket process or approach, and it isn’t an accusation to throw between departments (“they didn’t do their civic engagement right”). Too broad. Too little accountability for our mutual roles in the commitment to involve the public in our work in meaningful ways. b. Civic Engagement is the outcome, not the activity, a state of being, a way of life. c. In order to realize our engagement outcomes, we must work in ways that involve the public meaningfully. d. In order to involve the public in meaningful ways, we must continually act as navigators and guides of how our complex system (government) works; help the public understand their role in change, improvement, and decision-making; and help the public understand our mutual roles in the partnership. e. As navigators, we help citizens through complex processes with varying roles (regulatory, transactional, programming, aspirational) f. To make it meaningful, we clarify what the public’s role is in each project: • Do we need to inform? • Are we including them in some decision-making? • Are we inviting new ideas? • Are we collaboratively dreaming about the future together? • How do we respond to new ideas outside of our process?

5. Establish Planning and Project Management Processes that enable us to prioritize and get out in front of difficult issues. a. Articulate the workload and workflow between the departments, the Mayor’s Office and the City Council Office.

• Centrally track, prioritize, manage change, report on and ask for help on projects. • Establish a method for evaluating new ideas that impact the workload. • Use the forecasted workflow to scan the horizon, gain visibility to upcoming projects, get out in front of controversy through planning and preparation. • Regularly review events, public meetings, and informal public interactions as opportunities to reinforce key messages, themes, and calls for involvement.

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b. Glean the best of the Planning Division process that can be applied to and used throughout all departments. • Work with departments to formally recognize that they will make decisions based upon standards and policies. • Continue to test the Engagement Planner Template as a tool to teach early planning, stakeholder identification, risk assessment, and communications strategy. • Strive to add a self-guided checklist for planning the communications portion of the Engagement Planner. • Develop best practices for tools that is part of the planning process; continue education and skill-building of the “community of engagement practitioners.” c. Educate staff on the role of the CE Team as a resource for planning, forecasting and preparation, not limited to “crisis communications” once things blow up.

6. Update the Public Engagement Guide by the end of the first year of focused capacity building. a. Envision the Public Engagement Guide 2.0; the most relevant principles of the current Public Engagement Guide, along with best practices and Engagement Planner templates to facilitate application of the principles. b. Put initial emphasis on applying what exists in new ways of working, planning, and participating in staff work, based upon evaluation of results and involvement of the community of engagement practitioners. Make recommendations for next version. B. TRACKING ENGAGEMENT ACTIVITY

Salt Lake City develops a significant amount of content, programs, materials, and participates in a wide range of activities for interaction. We attempted to begin to catalogue those interactions in what we call “The Engagement Universe”. This attempt led to preliminary results that can be shared, but mostly illustrated that it is very challenging to identify, capture, track and assess the interactions we have with stakeholders on a regular basis. RECOMMENDATIONS:

7. Track what we can measure! RECOMMENDATIONS:

7. Track what we can measure!

OBSERVATION: Activities tend to be measured in terms of what was planned or developed. Less attention is given to the turnout, outcomes, responses, or “engagement” of those activities.

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a. Keep at the attempt to define the Engagement Universe. Perhaps a partner, more interns, better tools, etc., can be considered. The resources of time, budget and emotional effort are spent on so many individual activities; it is frustrating that the resources can’t be readily evaluated for effectiveness. b. Even in a less than perfect universe, it is important that the CE Team be aware of what we can track and measure; that where we can measure impact, we do; and that where we can’t measure, we are aware of that and establish other indicators of effectiveness. 8. Create a Public Input Opportunities Calendar. Initially use this calendar to enable the Civic Engagement Team to track upcoming projects and opportunities. Once established, make publicly available for stakeholders to track projects, issues and opportunities to participate. Determine how this integrates with(or is served by) the Agenda Management System. 9. Build debriefing sessions into the workflow of projects. Refer to Step 13 in the Public Engagement Guide and Recommendation in section A. regarding building a community of engagement practitioners.

C. CIVIC ENGAGEMENT TOOLS Salt Lake City has invested in a wide range of tools to provide transparency and facilitate involvement. A significant amount of technology tools have been developed to bring into fruition a vision for transparency: Accela, ProjectDox, Transparency Working Group, SLCgov.com website, blogs and WordPress sites, etc. In addition, Salt Lake City is a leader in launching or piloting tools to invite participation outside a physical meeting or appointment: Open City Hall, SpeakOutSLC, YourSLC, etc.

OBSERVATION: There is a lack of narrative and/or navigation as to what these tools are, how they are distinct from and relate to one another, and how they relate to and contribute to the decision-making process. They are difficult to find on the city’s website. There is minimal communications effort to draw people to and into the tools. In addition, there are problems with the website as it exists today. It is not serving as an engagement tool or facilitator for engagement. City staff discounts it, doesn’t feel empowered to use it as a tool to connect or develop audience for a variety of reasons, and as a result, the content is static.

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Because staff doesn’t feel empowered to use the slcgov.com site (tool), there is a tendency to create other sites. While these mostly still fall under IMS, the accumulative effect is to: • Dilute the search optimization and ability to analyze the site in order to measure effectiveness and engagement • Dilute and/or undermine the brand identity and the “voice of the city.” • Add to the significant amount of information that users must navigate to find relevant information or ways to get involved. • Create sites and pages that have minimal traffic. • Bury content that people want. Finally, of the 100K+ monthly unique visitors, most visit the site to pay a bill or look for a job. However, because the content is static, the navigation is challenging and the opportunities to “speak up” or “connect” through the site are limited, the usage is skewed.

We must reposition the City’s website from a place to inform to a resource to inform, invite, involve, and connect.

Beyond the website, the city’s centralized email list serve system is antiquated. As a result, staff and contractors at all levels manage email lists of people who want information, want to be proactively notified, or want to be involved, however, most of these are not in the centralized system. Because these contacts are kept at a local hard drive or within individual accounts: • We lose track of people throughout the process. Engagement is undermined as projects move from design to construction (often to a contractor) and the city isn’t maintaining communication. • People who identify with us on one project or issue aren’t then able to “opt-in” to other notifications or discussions. • City staff and consultants frequently seem to be starting from scratch to build a notification or engagement list.

We must create a citywide email system that cultivates long-term City-to-stakeholder communication relationships. RECOMMENDATIONS:

10. Create a new website interface - that invites involvement and facilitates

engagement.

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a. Commit to overhauling the website. Top-level priority for improving engagement in our city. b. Develop a new site or new web management approach through the filter of the city’s engagement priorities and outcomes. c. During the interim, develop a key group of practitioners to clarify objectives, practices, and training development required to move toward our engagement priorities and outcomes without having to wait for an entirely new system or approach. d. Provide resources in order to quickly pilot for the Community Asset Dashboard driven by Sorenson Unity Center. Learn from the pilot if the neighborhood asset or portal could help envision the city website as an engagement tool. Identify the resources required to manage such a tool, as well as develop user and content provider audiences. 11. Establish an up-to-date email system that facilitates a city-to-stakeholder

communications relationship. a. Consolidate current expense for department-level accounts to a centralized system that is priced for our enterprise-level usage. b. Establish business practices, permission levels and training on how to manage specific projects within a centralized tool. c. Cultivate the audience or subscriber base in the way in which media outlets or channels cultivate audience. This becomes a resource for project-level communications to “get the word out”. d. Provide a portal in which stakeholders can subscribe and follow the projects and types of issues that they want to track. Engagement increases as they opt-in; we leverage their subscription to educate on the process and complex conversations, not only project updates and news. e. Enable the City to become publishers and decrease our dependence on traditional media outlets. Integrate with City social media and web tools. f. Integrate the email system to the anticipated Agenda Management system. 12. Deploy Constituent Relationship Management (CRM) - in order to capture,

track and listen to constituent concerns and complaints in ways that enable us to address systemic issues, not just individual ones. a. Consider this a “listening tool” to capture constituent input and “listen” to data and trends. Consider that people who we are not currently hearing from in community meetings or formal City Council meetings may be continually interacting with the city on a transactional basis. Without a centralized system, we have no way of knowing, capturing data, analyzing data and incorporating it into decision-making.

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e. Enable staff to identify systemic problems earlier, act as an “early warning system.” f. CRM can contribute to an effort to break down department silos. g. CRM builds a tool and tracking mechanism to deploy consistent customer service. h. CRM can improve service and response by providing city staff with a larger picture of constituent interactions with the city. (Note: caution would need to be paid to ensure that this isn’t used or misinterpreted to be tracking “troublemakers.” i. CRM can increase productivity by providing structure and business practices around receiving and responding to complaints or issues. 13. Utilize SharePoint as an Enabling Tool. This was recently launched and what appears to be a significant investment in staff training was made. If this is the tool that the city has selected to support collaboration, break-down silos and improve planning, then the Civic Engagement Team can be the leaders on demonstrating these new ways of working using this tool. [Conversely, if there isn’t full support behind SharePoint outside of IMS, then that should be immediately evaluated before investing more attention and resources.] a. Civic Engagement Team embrace SharePoint as the tool to create a web presence for a growing community of engagement practitioners internal to the city. b. Build a Civic Engagement resource page for templates, best practices, etc. c. Determine if this can be shared or utilized externally with Community Councils, Community-Based Organizations and other partners collaborating to help stakeholders understand how government works, how to be involved, and expanding the voices of participation and feedback. d. If SharePoint is not the tool of choice, identify the desired enabling tool and begin to deploy within the next 12 months. 14. Develop integrated “City Construction Projects Map.” This project has been in development for a while, with work being done by Engineering, Public Utilities GIS, and perhaps, IMS. The completion of a web-based tool, one that lists all city constructions projects in process, can and

should be the forefront of communications around active construction projects, notification of impact, how city budgets are being spent, and, most importantly, conversations of larger transformative change.

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a. Apply necessary resources to get this map integrated enough so that it can be linked to the website homepage for “Construction Season” 2015 launch. b. Use the communications around this map and focused positioning on the website as a resource to help people get information about what they observe happening in their community! c. A graphic tool such as this connects people to what the city is doing that impacts them WITHOUT having to understand the City’s departments or budget allocation process in order to get some basic information. d. Think of the construction projects and this map as a portal for information and involvement. e. The map expands the platform for demonstrating the budget (your money) at work! f. Completing this map positions the city as a being connected to our time in terms of technology g. Use the launch of this map to organize the annual construction projects into a consolidated, branded “Construction Season” communications and marketing campaign, conducted not only with a desire to manage disruption and impact, but through the filters of engagement and inviting participation. ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT & TRAINING A. COMMUNICATIONS Communications as a practice is extremely under-resourced across the city to support the significant amount of content created from the departments and divisions. The scope of work generated by the divisions in a city of this size (and dealing with the scale of growth and change), limits the ability of the Communications staff in the Mayor and City Council Offices to provide adequate communications and message strategy, support, and work for the administration overall. The staff that exists throughout the departments and divisions has varying degrees of communications skills, abilities, and responsibilities. They need to be appropriately trained, developed and coordinated with larger messages. The majority of the communications expense appears to be funded through projects. Consultants hired for public involvement, messaging, outreach, marketing, engagement, etc. We also have contractors and consultants hired for specific planning, technical studies, design and construction projects that have a public involvement component or expectation.

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The graphic, “look & feel” and the visual communications for the city is also broadly distributed. Staff members with varying degrees of capabilities and skills for graphic design or training and experience in using graphic design software products are assigned tasks at all levels with varying results. Consultants and contractors are hired to design or produce elements of a brand, identity, graphic look and feel, and more at the project, department, and initiative level. These conditions lead to undermining engagement – or distance and cynicism – as opposed to facilitating engagement.

We must add communications staff and tools that position individual projects and programs within a larger long-term conversation regarding change, cultivate the city-to-stakeholder communications relationship, and facilitate engagement.

RECOMMENDATIONS: 15. Cultivate an Engaging City Voice. Review all communications, public involvement and community relations through the lens of engagement and transformation vs. projects and tasks: a. Strive to work in ways that doesn’t breed cynicism! b. Be consistent in voice, tone and attitude c. Create user profiles for the City overall and for projects and programs specifically; be clear about who the audience is (at a very personal level); be intentional about how the communications are developed and delivered within the context of the city’s engagement principles. d. Provide training, coaching, review and mentoring to apply this user voice across all departments, projects and contractor relationships! 16. Establish best practices for communication as part of engagement. a. Establish clear expectations for User Interface - tone, voice, attitude that reinforces the city’s commitment to partnership. b. Always provide navigational tools between the specifics and the larger context.

OBSERVATION: The net impact of this structure is that it undermines the city’s ability to strategically conduct long-term conversations with the community regarding change. There also is no clear ownership of the “city voice” (distinct from the elected officials’ voices) throughout initiatives, projects, programs and activities. Finally, the stewardship of the city- to- resident relationship is not centralized or consistent.

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c. Ensure planning for projects allows adequate time for identifying the stakeholders, clarifying the issues, forecasting difficult or controversial issues, establishing the messaging and responses to tough questions, and allows for proper review and edit of the communications pieces.

17. Facilitate strategic communications expertise deeper within the organization. a. Identify a process with the Communications Director to evaluate, weigh-in and provide oversight for department and project-level communications. b. Clarify interactions between central communications and departments. c. Determine tools to mentor, train, develop and provide feedback. B. ROLES The roles between Civic Engagement, Communications and Community Relations as departments and teams are not clear.

RECOMMENDATIONS: 18. Clarify roles of Civic Engagement, Communications and Community

Relations teams. a. Determine the various roles within the three existing departments or teams. b. Clarify collective and individual strategies. c. Identify areas of overlap and/or collaboration. d. Determine a new structure that enables the recommendations and actions highlighted in this report to be brought to fulfillment. C. CUSTOMER SERVICE There are varying levels of awareness of, and commitment to customer service throughout city departments. Also, there are a variety of expectations articulated through different training programs.

RECOMMENDATIONS: 19. Support current customer service programs and strive to develop a

citywide, consistent program. a. Identify the current customer service expectations and programs in place.

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b. Pay close attention to the evaluation of these programs. How are the current employees being trained, evaluated, rewarded or held accountable for customer service? What is the impact of not meeting the expectations? c. Strive to develop a citywide consistent program. d. Consider investing in this program and recommendation. While the Civic Engagement Team should be involved, someone with the required skills and expertise should be hired to work with City leadership to develop this. D. COMMUNITY CAPACITY BUILDING The Community Council Structure is established and enviable, in spite of many elements that currently make it too narrow to be effective in building our confidence that the feedback is representative. However, don’t give up on it!

RECOMMENDATIONS: 20. Support community councils and other community organizations to

encourage growth and implementation of best practices and new ideas. a. Engage a strong partner to develop a systemic approach to reinventing the Community Council structure to meet the expectations of a new generation. University of Utah, UVU Office of New Urban Mechanics, Westminster College are all possible local partners. There are just as many potential national collaborators as well. b. Demonstrate new ways of interacting / getting the discussion to the larger needs of the neighborhoods. c. Pilot different things in different groups and share results for expansion. d. Look for strong ideas to pollinate! (Business Spotlight at Sugar House). e. Develop high school and college internships with emphasis on the experience meeting the needs of the interns, which puts the burden on the participating Community Council to think of their work and interactions in terms of relevance. f. Communications TO the Councils that are focused on community management vs. just city news (city news, too, but always an element of skill-building, perhaps even thematic). g. Evaluate the role of the Community Liaison. Clarify the expectations. Train and provide information and support to ensure they are representing the city (or Mayor’s) vision and voice well.

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h. Support all presenters at Community Council meetings (Mayor’s office staff as well as others) with training for neighborhood interactions, consistent materials and messages. i. Continue to build the rest of the “community based organizations” to find new points of connections to address city issues / values. j. Create connections between School PTSA and SCC with Community Councils Do they already exist? How can the city support or expand those connections so that the Community Councils have vision to the needs and dynamics that are often first visible within the schools? k. High School assets – consider how to use teachers, programs and students to (a) connect Community Council attendees with issues that arise from changing dynamics, and (b) personalize the changing demographics of Salt Lake City and the needs that arise from change.

VII. Next Steps The five most-critical next steps that the Civic Engagement Team can begin working on right away: A. Begin using the Engagement Planner templates to help city staff organize their work in ways that identifies the public’s role in the process at the onset; personalizes

the stakeholders – internal and external – at the beginning of the project; connects the individual project to larger citywide initiatives, philosophies and messages of change; and anticipates potential obstacles, pushback, or areas of controversy in the early project planning work, allowing for focused training, involvement or preparation of staff and resources. B. Conduct the biennial Citywide Survey in Fall 2014 using both a self-administered online methodology, as well as a simultaneous telephone survey. This will enable the city to adequately test the migration to a new, forward-thinking methodology. It positions the CE Team as a partner working with the Mayor’s Office and the City Council as we approach the city residents. It provides the basis to develop and embolden the “city voice” and the long-term, city-to-stakeholder relationship critical to effective engagement capacity. C. Train key city staff on “Giving and Receiving Feedback” that builds the capacity of technically-sophisticated staff to interact with others - external stakeholders, impassioned residents, and internal colleagues - in ways that facilitates engagement. This training should focus on teaching staff to monitor the emotional aspects of human interactions, both the emotions of others as well as their own; the ability to navigate complex social environments that one encounters in public meetings, open houses, and community events; and the best practices in communications around managing and leading change. D. Add communications staff to provide resources in the content areas that are most complex, most challenging, and most controversial. The areas of greatest short-term need and greatest long-term impact are Transportation (Bike Lanes, Streetcar, and creating more transit riders on a limited system), CED and Public Services working together (Pioneer Park and surrounding district, Jordan Par-3 repurposing, Golf Enterprise Fund, etc.); the implementation of the West Salt Lake Master Plan, along with coordination of resources, community assets, and leadership development; and the areas of community need, including Homeless Solutions; Diversity, Human Rights, and Refugee; Aging in Place for older adults; and high-density housing and living plans. Sustainability and clean air initiatives are equally important, but currently have a higher level of communications support. However, integrating the sustainability initiatives and strategies to larger messages of vision, change and need is critical.

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E. Create a new website interface that invites involvement and facilitates engagement. While you are at it, link the web interface to the deployment of a citywide email tool, a Constituent Relationship Management system, and an Agenda Management Tool. Sounds daunting, but realigning our current investment in technology toward an integrated, agile, and user-friendly approach is the most transformational strategy for engagement long term.

Authentic engagement occurs when all people understand the public process and are empowered to get involved. The Civic Engagement Team looks forward to helping city staff and officials work in ways that demonstrate and build the partnership between internal and external stakeholders, toward our vision of systemic, sustainable, and authentic engagement.

CIVIC ENGAGEMENT TEAM Six Month Action Plan

December 2014

Prepared by: Nole Walkingshaw, Manager of Institutional Engagement Robyn Stanczyk, Community Manager

Civic Engagement Team Six Month Action Plan

1. Utilize the Engagement Planning templates (attached) on upcoming projects.

An Engagement Planning ‘packet’ will be created, which will include an Engagement Planning template, Roles and Responsibilities template, list of available tools (i.e. Open City Hall, press releases, email services, newsletters) and a list of city resources and contacts. The packet will be made available online on a shared site. Train staff working on projects involving public outreach on the use of the templates. The intent is to help them organize their work in ways that identifies the public’s role in the process from the beginning; connects the project or activity to larger citywide initiatives, philosophies and messages; and anticipates potential obstacles or areas of controversy early on, allowing for training and preparation of staff.

2. Create a Training Program for Public Engagement

Oversee training of key staff members involved in public engagement activities on ‘giving and receiving feedback’ for effectively interacting with external stakeholders, impassioned residents and internal colleagues. Introduce tools and demonstrate how to integrate them into the day-to-day work of staff to build capacity for communicating on projects and activities in ways that increase understanding and facilitates involvement. Orientation of all new hires regarding open government and transparency should continue, and be expanded to focus on new hires who have planning, project management and public involvement in their scope of work to ensure they are trained and oriented to the community of engagement practitioners in the first thirty days of their employment.

3. Partner with the Mayor’s Office and City Council to conduct the biennial Citywide Survey.

Analyze survey results to identify trends, interests, and desires of the public. Incorporate the results into our engagement philosophy and efforts in order to begin establishing a ‘city voice’ and set the stage for a long-term city-to-stakeholder conversation and relationship.

4. Online Civic Engagement Site

Develop a centralized SharePoint site for Civic Engagement to breakdown silos, increase collaboration and improvement planning. The site will contain tools and resources, such as: Templates Processes and guidelines Designs, logos, photos After Action Reports and Best Practices Blog – updated monthly This site would be open to all city employees and administered by the Civic Engagement Team.

5. Increase Communications Staff Citywide

Begin with the areas of greatest need, greatest long-term impact and least resources. Those areas and positions have been identified as: • Google Fiber construction impacts • Transportation Division • CED and Public Services in coordination, for implementation of major plans and

initiatives

6. Provide Assistance to City Departments in Developing Policies and Procedures to Comply with the Recognized Community Organizations Ordinance.

Section 2.60.050.D of Salt Lake City Code states: Notice Procedures: The city departments shall develop policies and procedures to show how they will provide notice and early participation opportunities for pending major city actions. These include, but are not limited to, public meetings, development projects, planning activities, grant and funding opportunities, which may have a significant impact on the membership of a registered community organization. Notice shall be given to affected community based organizations in a timely manner, including information on the time frame for a response. The Civic Engagement Team will work with city staff to educate them on the requirements of this section and provide them with the tools and resources necessary to comply with the responsibilities outlined in Chapter 2.60.050.

Engagement Planner Template Project Name: Dept / Division: Project Manager: Primary Contacts: Project Description (in plain language): Goal / Desired Outcome of the Project: Project Timeline: Project Budget: Public Involvement & Communications Budget: Related Projects or Initiatives: Background: What type of project is this? [Highlight those that apply]

• Strategic/visioning/starting from scratch • Implementing an adopted plan / building for the future • Maintenance/management/stewardship • Emergency/responding to urgent need

Which of the following will this project impact or influence (circle all that apply) CIP Ordinance Policy Master Plan Element Plan Other: Why has this project been proposed at this time? [to be completed] Who has signed-off/approved this project? [to be completed] What’s the relative scale of this project within other city projects or initiatives? What has happened so far? What has the public influenced in that work? How have we responded? Note: Provide documentation links or sources for this work Public Involvement:

Engagement Planner Template Who are the effected parties? [What is the Group needed to assemble to answer these questions?] Who are the advocates? Who are the known opposition? Is there an existing contact list for the current stakeholders? Decision Making Process: Who will make the decision? Are there existing standards or policies which will be used to assist in the decision-making process? How can the public influence the decision? / How does the public need to be involved in this project? [Highlight those that apply]

• Inform them and minimize impact to their daily lives • Inform of the process and invite them to be a part – when? How? Advocates • Input – we have a choice or a question and need your input • We have a blank slate and want to know what is important to you!

Communications and Involvement: What communications are needed outside of the specific public input on the project?

• Public information • Project stage and progress • Project sponsors and supporters • Next Steps

What tools are in place? Key Issues: Key Messages: Roles & Responsibilities: Actions & Meeting Notes:

Project Title Roles and Responsibilities

Salt Lake City Other agencies Other agenciesOwner Role Role

Task 1: Project start-up

Task 2:

Task 3:

Task 4:

Task 5:

Task 6:

Task 7: