A Really Difficult Public Meeting Coming Soon...some process thoughts

Wow, this is going to be tough.

Fact: Thousands of Kamloopsians, from all walks of lifes, oppose the proposed creosote tie gasification plant. (Facebook group now stands at 2915 members and Conservative MP Cathy McLeod and NDP stalwart Micheal Crawford both oppose). Passion and emotion are running very high.

Fact: ACC President Kim Sigurdson, plant proponent, says he is coming to town to counter misinformation and feels his public consultation has been sound. He has all the permits in place to start plant operations and has said he is going ahead. This from various media reports.

Fact: Our Federal MP and Provincial MLAs now oppose plant because they feel public consultation process has been very poor.

How do we keep this degenerating into a total gong show? I think this is so important to ponder. Here are some initial thoughts based on my training, thinking, and experience around public engagement:

1. it would be good to have an third party facilitator agreed upon by ACC and Save Kamloops, the two organized sides to the issue.

 2.  it would be good if the company reps acknowledged their horrible public engagment up until this point, apologized, and then committed to a respectful and open process for the meeting. ACC should acknowledge respectfully the opposition of many, and not downplay it.

 3.  it would be good if the company had all their experts and consultants present, no matter where they needed to travel from.

 4. I would probably advise against an open mic, at least initially. I might suggest table discussions, faithfully recorded, to record concerns and questions. If attendees really insisted on open mic, then I might suggest setting up ground rules at the start of the meeting – asking people to make commitments as to try to keep the meeting respectful, productive, and not a gong show.

 5. I’d ask the company to take great pains to make their technical information understandable to the lay person and respond to questions and concerns as faithfully as possible.

6. I would ask people to wait until the meeting was over to voice further judgements.

The Kamloops Chamber, who are sponsoring the meeting, already have some good practices in place for their events of this nature - no banners or buttons, questions written down and given to third party to ask (on what basis are these questions screened, if at all)

Comments

[Kevin Skrepnek]

If I would trust any group to run a meeting like this, it would be the Chamber. They will ensure it is as civil and constructive as possible.

[Arjun Singh]

Chamber does have a stellar reputation, wondering if it has credibility among the Save Kamloops organizers. Hope the Chamber reaches out to the opponents before the meeting. Very likely they will.

[John Vermilyea]

After reading Mel's Article, I must say I beleive he is more for open and honest dialogue between all parties involved, and not so much Pro ACC, but more like Pro Respect, from both sides...

Listen and Learn instead of Yell and Scream...

[Gary T]

As always Arjun, you are the voice of reason and the suggestions you make are very good.