story and question

Tue Jul 29 05:36:31 PDT 2003

Dear Avner,
(all this is in the context of my work in Germany, which is a
"given", and maybe I am completely off with my hunch that some of
this might also apply to your situation)
in my experience with urban development projects (in the city of
Oranienburg as part of a European/German federal government program
called "Future of city neighborhoods", and in one of the Districts of
Berlin in connection with yet another program called "Neighborhood
Management") there are factors that facilitators always confront but
need even more attention than lets say in a business, a school, a
hospital.
One is the question: "Who is the sponsor?" This can be complex
especially when the "agent" that you think is the sponsor (like the
city government, the local mayor, the city council, etc.) has the
tendency to delegate things to other "agents" in his hierarchy (like
the city planning department) who in turn delegate most of the
activity to someone who has been hired to do the "professional
planning" (as a commercial enterprise) for the entire city who then
delegates most of the activity, including the writing of the letter
of invitation for an open space (the inviter is in fact the mayor) to
subcontractors.
Here, I have learned to insist that the mayor or someone very close
to him needs to be in the planning group preparing the open
space...in fact, the better you get the "whole system into the room"
idea into the planning group in a sort of miniature "whole system",
the better.This might also include some of the city planning people
and the professionals mentioned above but certainly some "ordinary"
citizens, including youths and kids.
The other thing I have learned (in extension of Birgitt Williams
approach) in this particular context is to assist on clarification of
the givens. It seems quite ok for citizens to involve themselves in
planning processes pretty regardless of what the "givens" are...they
just have to really know about them. If they know that they can make
suggestions but that someone else eventually decides about these
suggestions, thats fine. If they know that none of the suggestions
they make are going to turn into projects unless they themselves play
an active role in it, thats fine, too. (Mind you, in the long run,
people will still do the things that they have a passion for and are
willing to take responsibility for).
One thing that surprised me, is that the "givens" in urban planning
projects I just talked about are often "clear as mud" or at least
perceived pretty differently at differnt levels or in different
departments of the city, so that the planning group trying to figure
out what they are, provides a valuable service.
Once the planning group is clear on who the sponsor is (and hopefully
the sponsor realizes what that means) and what the givens are, the
question of what that means and how it is communicated comes up.
In my experience, it is important for the sponsor to actually face up
to being it. Sounds normal, but in these urban development processes
where the players are under all kinds of demands, it is unusual for
the sponsor to actually take part in the planning process, design and
sign the invitation, go out and publicize the event, show up at the
event and actually stay and work with the citizens and all the others
that show up and participate in the follow up events.
Communicating the givens can be done by providing them to everyone
before the event (simple things like a map of the territory in
question, the number of years expected for the planning, the amount
of funds available, things that are immutable, things that are up for
changes, quality of the participation by people attending the open
space, etc.). This relieves you from having a bunch of inputs at the
event itself...but the people providing the givens need to be at the
event, including material that is perhaps shown on information walls,
pictures, plans, etc.and an identification of the "experts" at the
event that have more detailed information).
Elections, hmmm. In my naive way I thought the political officers
would just love the exposure to a large crowd of citizens especially
when thinking of the next elections. What I found, though, is that
they would much rather talk to a couple of business people or other
"influential" people at another meeting that might take place
parallel to the open space and then excuse themselves with the remark
that they have this or that important meeting to go to. This must
certainly not be true for all elected officials...but you might want
to really explore in depth on how to get those "influential" people
that the mayor would rather see than the single mom concerned about a
deteriorating playground in her neighborhood to come and participate
in the open space. The planning groups I worked with had just limited
success in this effort but I would prod them to be much more thorough
the next time.
Love to hear more of your project. This might also be a topic of
concern in Denmark: os in urban developement projects.
See you,
mmp

PS: in one of the recent issues of FutureSearching I wrote a piece
about the difficulty in finding a "sponsor" for a future search in a
neighborhood...pretty much applies to open space, too.

And the question:
We (with Tova) are in a process of using OS in the context of =
inhabitants participation in building a "Master- Plan" for a small
city. =
 We would be very thankful to hear and learn about your experience in
=
this kind of work, especially on the allignment with the city
planners =
and the planning stages, and how coming elections effects it?

Thank you

Avner Haramati
Jerusalem

Michael M Pannwitz
boscop
Draisweg 1
12209 Berlin, Germany
FON +49 - 30-772 8000     FAX +49 - 30-773 92 464
www.michaelmpannwitz.de

An der E-Gruppe "openspacedeutsch" für deutschsprechende open space-PraktikerInnen interessiert? Enfach eine mail an mich.

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