Jane McWilliams, LWV Observer
5:00 p.m., Northfield Hospital Board Room
In addition to all city council, staff members Joel Walinski (City Administrator) and Jennifer Nash (his Administrative Assistant) were present. Citizens Randy Jennings, Griff Wigley, Alice Thomas, and the League observer were present for some or all of the meeting.
Irena and Richard Fursman served as facilitators for this session which resulted in identification of the areas where the council wants to focus during 2010: completion of the Land Development Code, working on the Police and Fire Department facilities, creating sustainable land use policies, and attending to many aspects of communication. *
Early in the session, the facilitators asked the councilors to fold a piece of paper in half and on one side record (draw, write) something in the first half of their life which they think informs the kind of person they are now. On the other side, record something from the second half which also has influenced them. This exercise was intended not only for councilors to learn more about one another (many came from large families, for example), but also to identify other things they had in common. Some common traits Fursman gleaned from this process: self-reliance, work ethic, care for others, community involvement, leadership.
Walinski had provided the council a list of accomplishments in the areas of the 2009 goals which are:
*Council will implement effective methods of communication with citizen advisory groups and community.
*Council will build a foundation for a vibrant community where resources are carefully managed and preserved and which integrates economic, environmental and community values for long term objectives.
*Council will improve city facilities to ensure excellent service to our citizens within the financial limitations of the city.
The 4th goal, “The council will implement a systematic approach to problem solving and decision-making”, was not discussed this evening although Walinski had provided a similar analysis of it. This will be taken up at a later meeting. (Goals and Initiatives may be found at: http://www.ci.northfield.mn.us/assets/2/2009-Goals-and-Initiatives.pdf)
As is often done in this kind of group process, the council (with Walinski participating) listed strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and challenges of the accomplishments. They were then asked to select the most important components of these. The list they generated was: land development, clarifying and managing priorities, unpredictable local government aid, transparency, process for bringing ideas forward, action steps for boards and commissions, CIP priorities and financial strategies, communication with public, green cities, and methods for council to bring forward proposals.
Richard Fursman asked what the council wanted to complete this year. “You’ve got an incredibly full plate.” The next step was to determine what the council wants to accomplish in the next 11 months, based on the above list. Pairing up, councilors wrote down their top 5 action steps which they pasted below each goal displayed on the wall. Finally, using the ubiquitous dot system, they ranked their action steps. There was a dizzying array of possible steps which they boiled down to the four mentioned above.*
The facilitators said they would capture the information the council had generated and present it to them for their review and verification. This will then be used to provide direction to the boards and commissions. Council Erica Zweifel suggested that the council needs assistance with tracking their progress over time.
The group disbanded shortly after 10:00.
[This is a difficult sort of event to record, as much of what is important is the interchange between councilors as they went through the process. Several primary themes emerged: sincere desire to be in touch with the public in order to make good decisions, and a sense that the public isn’t aware of much of the progress the city has accomplished. This helps explains the large number of action steps pasted under Goal 1. Although on Walinski’s list there were 10 accomplishments under that goal, he also mentioned the need for better communication and transparency in decision-making, and continued complaints of access to information on the city’s website as ongoing concerns.]
Comments
Jane: from your report it is almost impossible to see evaluation of their previous goals and specific goals for the coming year except for the third, which obvious refers to the new safety center facility.(Library being several years off).
This language is bureaucratic boilerplate at best, and I would have hoped for a more purposeful discussion...
Was it more detailed but too difficult to quantify?
After reading Councilor Buckheit's blog update this Morning, I am disturbed to see that my concerns about the council retreat are confirmed.
At our LWV planning meeting a strong direction, about two to one, was given to the Board to be primarily concerned with the Council's process of government. I hope that becomes a reality, instead of many dots on a chart.
We are in a situation where a citizen must fill out a Data Practice request to get a piece of public information like a Council meeting disc... and where members of a statutory Board (EDA) cannot get the contract to review when they are asked to allot tens of thousands of public dollars... and where they are ridiculed and defamed for even asking.
This is past unacceptable; who will do anything about it if the LWV does not?
Kiffi - Yes, the session was (for me) not easy to capture accurately.
They didn't evaluate the 4 goals per se. Looking instead at the lists of "accomplishments" they ranked these according to their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and challenges. They then chose what they thought were the most important of these. This was odd because each item on the list lost its SWOC desiignation in the process, but became fodder for the net step - net year's "goals".
Perhaps the facilitators had to alter their methodology midway, due to lack of time, or, perhaps, they were working with a document which didn't fit their methology.
Take a look at the document they were working from and see that the nomenclature is a bit confusing.
Maybe what they did will be clearer to you when you see the facilitators' "massaged" version of the many little slips of paper they generated.
Betsey has blogged about how helpful the evening was for her. I wonder how other councilors feel. As I reported above, if they came up with a helpful product, it was time well spend. If not, perhaps just having time to talk and process their various views will help them be more productive during 2010. Certainly, they know one another better than then and know more about their individual and collective SWOC than they did at last year's goal setting day.