Opinion: Your Views Matter When They Agree With the City

My eyes have been opened to how many times city officials said there was robust public engagement to justify projects and spending. As someone who has organized public input, and just this week saw a massive outpouring of public engagement on the Belmar Park development, I wondered how the city defined ‘robust engagement’.

It turns out, resident engagement numbers are not much different from City engagement numbers.

Why this should matter to you?  Because resident-backed projects are not considered for approval even when they clearly have support.

Let’s look at the example of Wright Street Park, which was lauded for its public engagement. According to the city, “Outreach for these meetings included a postcard to any resident residing within 1,000 feet of the park and door to door engagement with the nearby apartment complex managers. We [Lakewood] also share all of our projects on Lakewood city channels including the Friday Report, Lakewood 8, social media, our e-newsletters and Nextdoor.”

The survey for Wright St included about 210 respondents. There is no record of how many came to an in-person meeting but about 50 watched the video and 23 submitted ideas so 200 is a good estimate.

Lakewood residents have whipped up the support of 100s of people, even without money to spend or dedicated staff. However, they don’t get the same results. Why does Lakewood’s engagement process take priority and resident engagement doesn’t?

How many times have residents heard, “We [the city] hear you but we also have to listen to other residents who are not here.”

Well, now you know that when the city wants to hear the answer, 200 people is enough.

Residents that have organized hundreds of people have already had their eyes opened. Without the benefit of paid staff and resources that the city has, they’ve reached the same levels of engagement the city applauds. Why then are residents so frequently dissatisfied?

However, thinking it through, even the engagement for Wright St didn’t matter. The city didn’t listen to people, it USED them. The city:

• DID NOT ASK “would residents rather have Wright Street Park developed or other projects residents have been asking for that the city neglected?”
• DID NOT ADD “We are using resident TABOR funds for this project because the city achieved other goals… would residents like the money back now or should the city keep spending?”  
• DID NOT EVEN ASK “This park has been enjoyed as is for decades so should it stay that way or should the city commit to increased future maintenance costs?”

By responding to such a survey, residents have already agreed to the underlying premise that the city is right to develop this project and that’s all they really wanted – approval of the idea. That approval was then quoted at a budget meeting as if residents had been asked for fund approval or project approval. They were not.

Does the city even recognize that their “engagement” is often lobbying in disguise? They think, “Yay! How can we spend your money here?” while residents over there are begging for restoration of services and being absolutely ignored. But by going through this engagement process, every department head can come to a budget meeting and show the shiny new project they spent TABOR funds on, a silent request for more, leaving unsaid all the old projects they ignored.

So, in a way, the numbers never matter because the city will not ask unbiased and non-leading questions.  

When the City cites ‘robust engagement’ to have their projects approved, were the residents truly engaged or just sought out for approval? No wonder resident-initiated engagement doesn’t get results.