Move over, Facebook — there’s a new online platform for sharing views and opinions on public matters in town, and this one has a direct line to city staff and elected officials.
The city of Asheville launched its new public engagement website, Open City Hall, on Thursday, March 17. The Internet-based platform is the creation of Berkeley, Calif.-based Peak Democracy, a technology company currently providing cloud-based online services to more than 100 government agencies in the United States. According to the company’s website, some of Peak Democracy’s clients have been using the platform for more than five years.
The platform’s inaugural topic asks Ashevilleans whether the city should allow accessory dwelling units (also known as ADUs, garage apartments or in-law suites) to be used for short-term rental purposes under the city’s Homestay ordinance, and what impacts that use might have on neighborhoods. As of Monday, March 21, over 150 responses had been submitted on the issue.
City Communications Specialist Polly McDaniel will serve as the primary liaison for the platform. “The City of Asheville places a high value on participation in the decision-making process,” says McDaniel. “This tool will make it easier for many people to participate — and have a voice — in Asheville city government initiatives.”
In the near future, the online platform will be used to gather public input on the city’s upcoming effort to update its comprehensive-plan and on the future of the Haywood Street and Page Avenue properties. According to McDaniel, the city plans to follow best practices by posting no more than one or two topics in any month.
McDaniel says the results of surveys, polls and open-ended questions will be compiled and presented to City Council members in staff reports. Anyone can view all responses on any question online, and the results will be archived and retained indefinitely. This method of gathering feedback and input, McDaniel says, will be used in addition to — and not instead of — other forms of public engagement such as community meetings, public hearings and constituent email communications to elected officials.
After getting the go-ahead from City Council’s Governance Committee last year, McDaniel explains, Director of Community and Engagement (CAPE) Dawa Hitch led an effort to identify the best service provider for an online public engagement tool. Over a six-month period, CAPE staff researched several platforms, eventually concluding that Peak Democracy’s Open Town Hall product had most of the desired features in one platform.
Peak Democracy will provide a comprehensive service contract, which includes monitoring for civil and on-topic comments, as well as support to help the city craft effective discussion topics and surveys. The cost of the contract is $9,500 per year, which covers an unlimited number of users, topics and cloud-based data storage. The city signed a three-year contract for the service.
Chris Joyell, executive director of the Asheville Design Center, says his organization plans to make use of the platform during the upcoming public visioning process to determine the community’s preferred use of city-owned properties on Haywood Street and Page Avenue. “We have a volunteer looking at the capabilities of the system, and we are looking forward to using it to increase public engagement in the visioning process.”
“The hope is that, in the future, we will be able to use the platform in real time during meetings, so that citizens can participate remotely,” McDaniel explains. “Though we need a little more time to work with the system before we roll that out, the platform has that capability.”
Local technology entrepreneur Ty Hallock, who is working with a partner to develop Trusted Sharing, another online collaboration tool, thinks the new platform has the potential to increase public participation. “Now, people sometimes feel like they have tried to be heard and it hasn’t worked,” he comments. “A lot of people are disenfranchised in their efforts to connect with local government. If this is a medium for helping them, I think it’s going to be very successful.”
Though registration is not required, it is encouraged. McDaniel says registration allows the city to identify which commenters actually live in Asheville and are true stakeholders in the local community.
The platform limits each participant to one comment or response per issue. The company’s website explains: “Blogs are frequently dominated by bullies that post multiple comments. This intimidates constituents and gives bullies an unfair advantage. We use in-house software and staff to authenticate every participant, and restrict each participant to only one comment per topic so they can’t dominate, argue or attack each other.”
“This tool gives residents the opportunity to participate in the decisions that shape our community from the privacy and convenience of their own home,” Hitch said in a press release. “We want the public to be part of the process and they’re online.”
1. ?
2. Citizens can request that COA add thier citizen issues and it costs $28,500 to start a ‘Peak Democracy’ account.
3. ?
Better yet, who’s this “peak hot air democracy but really elitist totalitarianism” in bed with among the establishment?
Sweeeet!
A social media driven website with no vested interest in our lives limited to one comment as those awful bullies sometimes use facts?
Finally the city of Asheville can ignore anti Mammonite driven development comments in favor of
“yay omg more breweries, overpriced hotels and crushing the poors beneath the wheels of making us, like Chaaaaaaaarlotte- yolo!”
How objective!
Sign me up!
Here’s my one comment-
A thin coat of veneer.
LOL, you think these tools want to hear reality? Why that might hurt their feelings lulz.
Who are you calling a tool, Mr. Tourettical?
Will this keep city council from putting Revenue Bonds in the Consent Agenda?
It’s so unfair that no one answers you when you ask these vaguely accusatory questions of no one in particular.
Stop changing the subject, bsummers! :-)
Sorry. You’re right.
Back to Mr. Peck and the indignant silence over his unanswered vaguely accusatory questions put to no one in particular, already in progress.
Why couldn’t he post his question on the Open City website? Don’t tell me he’s already been banned.
Preemption is always better.
Concentrate. Focus. Now, what is the topic?
Evil progressives? Tax slavery? Climate-change hoax? How many choices do we get?
LOL, why are China and India on tap to build 500 coal fired energy plants and the loons here not telling you that? Oh I forgot, they igore the economic impact and damage they promote all the while lying about everything else.
Hey lefty loon, no other country is going to follow you into suicide. Not economically, socially, or in any other way.
Oh, the topic is “Lefty Loons.” I’ll take Reuters for 100, Alex. https://sg.news.yahoo.com/china-halt-construction-coal-fired-power-plants-15-101849630.html
LOL, because there’s a glut lulz.
Like these loons better? https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/china-confronts-the-pain-of-kicking-its-coal-addiction/2015/10/28/24f23586-882b-43c3-ab4a-e223749293dd_story.html.
No. Try again. Take your time.
I’ve exhausted your known areas of expertise. You’re on your own.
Thanks for doing the graphic, MX. The lack of true renter inclusion is incredibly powerful in a town supposedly about listening to diverse stakeholders.
Renters have yet to be invited into city processes by leadership.
Grant, if an awareness of the renter’s perspective does become one that city government remembers to consider, that will be largely the result of your advocacy.
I have no role in COA civic engagement strategy, Virginia. That’s all up to the Mayor, city council and Gary Jackson. I have actually met with Mayor Manheimer and Gary covering civic engagement strategy. These folks have their own very strong perspectives on these matters.
Also, although renters make up half the population in Asheville now, half the media outlet products are not renter focused. Sorry to say.
But you may be saying the above as a compliment rather than with sarcasm. Mostly what I see from the city hall people is a ton of DDDS (Dismissive, Deflective, and Defensive Syndrome) when it comes to things like how many renters sit on all the COA boards and commissions. I’m over it in any case, but renter folks should form a Renters United co-op.
You are right, Grant: I did mean it as a compliment. Though it’s just an opinion, I think your advocacy on this issue has had the effect of bringing greater attention to it. Although you say you are over it, I think that bringing light to that group of Asheville residents has been a positive contribution.
Thank you, Virginia. You and Max are good solutions journalists.
The DDDS from the city hall people hurts. I’m just a renter in need of solutions too in the end though.