February 19, 2010
9:00 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. PST

White Stag Block
70 NW Couch St.
Portland, OR

Remote live webcast also available

Social media is a powerful tool for planners to stay connected with the community at large. However, municipal and professional planners are just starting to embrace how sites such as Facebook and Twitter can advance civic engagement and affect public policy. How do you maximize social media and avoid unforeseen meltdowns?

• The workshop will explore the following questions:
• How do you create and manage an outreach strategy using social media?
• How do you write for social media?
• What is appropriate content for social media messaging?
• Who monitors, maintains and manages social media online?

Session Activities

• Presentations from local Portland-Metro area cities describing the challenges and opportunities of applying social media tools at the municipal level.
• Survey of the national scene by the National Charrette Institute.
• Hands-on demonstration of the latest planning software allowing remote polling and data gathering using mobile phones and computers.

Moderators

Tina Osterink, Natural Resources Planner, City of Gresham
Bill Lennertz, Executive Director, National Charrette Institute

Speakers

Jamie Beckland, Emerging Media Manager, Whitehorse
Jane Heisler, Communications Director, City of Lake Oswego
Bill Lennertz, Executive Director, National Charrette Institute
Laura Bridges-Sheppard, Communications Manager, City of Gresham
Julia Thompson, City of Portland Bureau of Planning and Sustainability

Cost

OAPA: $75,  Non-members: $100, Students and Planning Commissioners: $45
Register by February 12, no refunds after February 8. Remote webcast password available at registration. Register and pay online at http://www.oregonapa.org/EventInfo2/
Mailing a check? OAPA at PO Box 3674, Wilsonville, OR 97070

AICP continuing education credits available

A joint presentation of the Oregon APA and the National Charrette Institute

Additional Information

Tina Osterink at 503-740-7285,  tina.osterink@greshamoregon.gov
Bill Lennertz at 503-233-8486, bill@charretteinstitute.org

Register for the NCI Charrette System™ Certificate and/or the NCI Charrette Management and Facilitation™ Certificate training before 2/12/10 and save. Additional discounts are available for non-profits, CNU members, OR/WA APA members and others.

Adding a NCI certificate to your credentials can improve your competitive advantage. Become a member of the select group of only 300 people who will earn a NCI certificate this year. As a participant in a NCI course you will join 31 other experienced professionals working intensively on hands-on case study exercises.

This March in Portland is one of only three opportunities this year to attend both of these valuable trainings. Sign up for these intensive, hands-on workshops and learn how to plan and manage projects using the proven NCI Charrette System™. With an uncertain economy and abounding political conflicts, the NCI Charrette System™ is more relevant and needed than ever. Learn more and register now to save.

Steve Coyle, NCI’s board member, will be apart of the interactive workshop, Shifting Attitudes on Sustainability and Climate Change: Civic Engagement Strategies for Individual and Community Action, February 5, 3:30-5:30pm. See the conference program for more details.

Register for the NCI Charrette System™ Certificate and/or the NCI Charrette Management and Facilitation™ Certificate training before 2/12/10 and save. Additional discounts are available for non-profits, CNU members, OR/WA APA members and others.

With an uncertain economy and abounding political conflicts, the NCI Charrette System™ is more relevant and needed than ever. This March in Portland is one of only three opportunities this year to attend both of these valuable trainings. Sign up for these intensive, hands-on workshops and learn how to plan and manage projects using the proven NCI Charrette System™. You will walk away with the tools needed to plan and manage a collaborative multiple-day charrette in addition to increasing your competitive advantage by adding NCI certificates to your credentials. Learn more now.

• NCI Charrette System™ Certificate - March 8-10
• NCI Charrette Management and Facilitation™ Certificate - March 11-12

Earn 27 AICP, AIA or ASLA credits for the full week of training.

NCI recently had a chat with PR expert Ben Brown about working with social media in public projects and found his following advice and insights valuable.

Ben recommends that if there is a hot political climate surrounding your plan, perhaps you should avoid starting your own project blog. Rather, do some homework to seek out the most influential bloggers in the community and try plugging into their activity. Treat them as you would the press; build a relationship based on respect and transparency. Provide them with information that relates to their interests, helping them as they report on the project. For instance, provide a bike advocacy blog with research and facts about the street and pathway design elements of the project.

The lesson is that even though social media sounds like a game-changing opponent to traditional media, the same rules apply. Focus on building relationships. If bloggers don’t have accurate, up- to- date information on a project there is no way they can accurately represent it. If you treat people with honesty and with respect they are more likely to provide a fair view of your project. As what can happen with the press and stakeholders in general, if you ignore people and don’t invite them to the party, they are likely to become cynical.

Other thoughts and experiences on working with established bloggers in the context of your projects? Give us your feedback in the comments…

NCI completed a Charrette System training for the City of Memphis Planning Department this month. Memphis staff are planning to conduct their own charrettes. NCI has also trained Baltimore County, Fayetteville and Birmingham for the same purpose. NCI faculty David Brain, and participants reported that the course went great and that Memphis does indeed have a great music scene.

NCI is researching the use of social media for public involvement. Who is effectively using Facebook, Twitter, etc.? What are the pitfalls? Is it really a good idea to have your own project blog or, rather, should you interact with existing influential blogs the way you would a newspaper, providing them with content and letting them do their work? We are looking for good examples to use for our training at the American Planning Association conference this spring in partnership with Placematters. We are also doing a seminar on this subject February 19 with the Oregon APA. Please share you thoughts on successes and failures in the comments below.

The topic of social media’s role in public planning processes is a hot one. NCI continues to research and present on the topic as we did at the annual Congress for the New Urbanism in June where Bill Lennertz of NCI and Ken Snyder of PlaceMatters spoke on “Hi-Tech, Hi-Touch Public Meeting Facilitation Tools for Charrettes.” PlaceMakers has a great post on the topic including video footage and a number of links to other resources. See it here.

This year’s NCI Best Practices Report focuses on Sustainable Community Charrettes. In the summer of 2008, NCI hosted a curriculum development summit in Chicago at the offices of Farr Associates. The purpose of the summit was to critique and revise the NCI Charrette System to address the unique requirements of sustainable community planning. Participating were sustainable charrette veterans Bob Berkebile, Sandy Wiggins, Dan Slone, Doug Farr, Jennifer Rezeli, Steve Coyle, and Bill Lennertz. The 2009 NCI Best Practices Report contains an overview of the sustainable charrette summit revisions to the NCI Charrette System in addition to articles by members of the summit group and other sustainable charrette practitioners. Topics include:

• The legal framework for sustainable plans
• Charrettes for limited budgets
• Changing community mindsets about sustainability
• The charrette for the post disaster recovery plan for Greensburg, Kansas
• A true bottom-up sustainable planning process for Omaha.

This report is available to all NCI members. Become a NCI member at any level and receive your copy of these latest writings on charrettes for sustainable planning.

NCI is proud to announce that we have been awarded a Federal Transit Administration (FTA) grant. NCI and Reconnecting America will partner to create the NCI Charrette System Guide for Transit Oriented Development (TOD). TODs are complex and challenging projects to plan and implement. Although much has been written on TOD case studies, as well as on particular tools for planning and public involvement, a comprehensive guide for planning a TOD using a multiple-day charrette does not exist. This grant supports the creation of the NCI Charrette System Guide for TODs, a scripted PowerPoint presentation based on the Guide, and the delivery of several free webinars.