Madison: Expect public input and info friendly changes with the Common Council

September 28, 2020 9:13 am

Many have tried, but COVID finally forced the city’s hand, and they had to make it happen. Now permanent changes are on the way!

BACKGROUND/GOALS/TASKS

The TFOGS (Task Force on Government Structure) committee tried, and then the Alder’s Workgroup on Communication Tools and Processes tried again. Meanwhile, COVID. Now, the workgroup is ready with their recommendations. If you never heard of the workgroup, perhaps that is because their agendas were never ready on Friday when I blogged the week ahead, they typically came out 48 hours in advance of the meeting. Sort of ironic . . . since they were supposed to be about better public input. Or . . .maybe that’s not really what it was about. Here’s their goals as stated in the draft report.

Objectives

1. Reduce the administrative burden on alders related to constituent communications. These burdens exist for both outbound and inbound communications.

Connect constituents with content that:
- is relevant;
- is timely;
- has the appropriate level of detail;
- is delivered by appropriate methods (mail, email, blog, various social media platforms, etc.);
- is delivered with method-appropriate formatting;
- reaches underrepresented and disenfranchised constituents;
- accommodates constituents with Limited English Proficiency (LEP), and
- accommodates constituents with Visual Impairment (VI).
Provide better access and usability for alders without IT backgrounds, including
- Make tools and processes easier to use, and
- Make training and support available

The committee was tasked with looking at:

Alder Blog & email subscriptions
Alder Home Page
How Alders share content via social media
Use of calendars for meetings and events
Templated/prepared content
Sharing of updates generated by city agencies

These are the topics they covered

Alder Blog Tool and Email Subscriptions
Input for Alder Blogs
Incoming Email Adjustments
Broadening the Audience for Alder and City Communications
Registration for and Input at Public Meetings
Alders Calendaring Tools
Council Social Media Policy and Social Media Platforms
Supplementing Postcard Notification with Digital Advertising
Legistar Improvements and Meetings (as it relates to communications)
Common Council Staff’s Role in Alder Communications

IDENTIFIED CONCERNS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

If you want to read more, see the draft report. And, to be fair, this is still a draft, but this is where the public, if they have something to say, should be paying attention. So, if you think something is missing here – you might want to say something!

Alder Blog Tool and Email Subscriptions

Concerns:

The current alder blogging tool is unfriendly by today’s standards and is difficult for many alders to use. The blogging tool is the primary method that many alders use to communicate with constituents, so modernizing it could decrease the amount of time alders spend writing blog posts and could make the information easier for constituents to digest.
Content provided by others for inclusion in an Alder Blog/Update is the subject of Work Group Topic #2.
The blogging tool’s associated email subscription management system has limited capabilities, e.g., alders cannot email their subscribers without making a blog post and it is not apparent that it is tied to the user’s City account.

Generally, the city email subscription management system for residents is confusing and difficult to use, including the subscription management for alder blogs.

Recommendations

As web-based or application-based blogging tools evolve, IT generally is evolving along with them. IT should have ongoing discussions with Council Staff so that new tools and capabilities for use by alders can be proposed for quicker implementation.
CCEC should periodically be informed by Council Staff about new capabilities that alders may want to consider adding to their blogging tool.
While this relates to several other Work Group topics, the ability for residents to self- manage their communications from both alders and the city should become more intuitive. Opt-in and Opt-out features should be reviewed, streamlined, and should include content-based opt-in and opt-out features for alder-provided content.

Input for Alder Blogs

Concerns:

info to get out to audience is city created information, that’s what we want, to make it easy. It is really city communications, alders can do more if they want, they can synthetize
Reduce duplicative efforts to create content (multiple alders preparing similar content) Make sure content delivery is timely (not too late, not too early)
- Make sure content is relevant to its audience
- Make sure content is accessible to non-English speakers/VI audience
- Make sure content has the appropriate level of detail

Look to reduce duplicative/irrelevant emails to all.alders from staff What about a weekly summary that goes out on Friday?
CC Staff point person for communications

Recommendations:

Much of this work is in progress. See report. No current additional recommendations

Incoming Email Adjustments

Concerns:

Emails sent via webform to Alders’ DistrictXX@cityofmadison.com accounts should be easier to scan to determine if the sender lives in your district, if they want a reply, subject matter, etc.

Recommendations:

Broadening the Audience for Alder and City Communications

Concerns:

None

Recommendations:

Much discussion in the draft report.
Work with TFOGS

Registration for and Input at Public Meetings

Concerns:

Make it easy for public to comment on any legislative item – special attention for people that have not been represented in the process historically
Maintain/strengthen impact of large public input/voice
Allow public comment to travel with legislative items across BCCs/council
Make sure those comments are easily viewed by BCC members
Make it easy for BCC support & other city staff to support this process

Recommendations:

Work with TFOGS

Alders Calendaring Tools

Concerns:

Calendaring
- Weekly meeting schedule
- Use of calendaring for alders
- For public
- Outlook/Google/Other Integration
How to communicate out events

Recommendations:

None at this time

Council Social Media Policy and Social Media Platforms

Concerns:

Some alders want city social media accounts so that they can post information there. Research shows that young people, in particular, use social media and access information via social media much more than email and oftentimes do not read email or subscribe to blogs.

Recommendations:

PHASE II, MORE Platforms, auto-publish for blog, social media, etc., could be automatic to have account too that takes no individual account, autoposting doesn’t have to be tied to a new blog tool. I available, could adjust downward requirements for participationg
Technical guidelines, dormant or not, who does it, etc.
Reiterate that personal is personal, how to be very clear, separation is easier for everyone, reduces expectations, and gives the cupport of the city to your Social Media usage

Supplementing Postcard Notification with Digital Advertising

Concerns:

Use of alder budget for outreach?

Recommendations:

Work with TFOGS

Legistar Improvements and Meetings (as it relates to communications)

Concerns:

Digital Ads Legistar
- Legislative information processes
- Recommendations on improving transparency
- Hybrid/Virtual Meetings
- Equity for virtual meetings – CCEC or TFOGS

Recommendations:

Work with TFOGS

Common Council Staff’s Role in Alder Communications

Concerns:

None identified yet

Recommendations:

None identified yet

DRAFT ELECTRONIC PUBLIC COMMENT IMPROVEMENT PROPOSAL

Goals

Make it easy for members of the public to comment on any legislative item – special attention should be given for people that have not been represented in the process historically
Ensure that electronic comments are easily accessed/viewed by BCC members
Allow public comment to travel with legislative items across BCCs/Common Council
Make it easy/efficient for BCC support & other city staff to support this process

Expected Outcomes

More members of the public will provide comments on legislative items more often
BCC/Common Council members will have better access to all public comments received
A reduction in public comments received via email to alders/committee members and a
streamlining of comment management duties for BCC support staff

Request/Deliverable

Online public comment form
- Primary input channel would be an online form
- Other channels could be available with a goal of redirecting people to the form or having staff assist with form completion (those without computer access could call into Council Office and staff could fill out form on behalf of caller)
- Ideally use the same form for those wishing to register to speak (desired but not required)
Information collected (Ensure transparent notification to registrants about how information will be shared)
- Name
- Address
- District/Alder
- Email or phone (for questions/responses)
- For/Against/Neither
- Lobbyist (Do we need to include lobbyist questions for e-comments like we do for
  registrants? What is required per ordinance?)
- Comment (character limit?)
- Ideally allows for submitting attachments (not a required feature)
Comments are available for review by BCC members
- Display all info collected in one consolidated document
- Report/statistics available for BCC member review (# of comments, # in support or opposition)
- Ensure that reports are real time or published/refreshed frequently
- Need to consider standards for record keeping – when is the record downloaded/uploaded?
- Privacy considerations – what content should be collected, stored, vs. shared publicly
  - Internal only info
  - Info share with BCC/CC members
  - Info publicly posted