Consultation Hub | Page 6

Facebook or Twitter, or a combination of both? The various forms of social media available offer varying benefit and drawbacks. The following is a comparison of the roles and functionality of Facebook and Twitter from the point of view of public consultation – intended to help you determine the best form of social media for ...

My book, Public Consultation and Community Involvement in Planning: a twenty-first century guide will be published by Routledge in July 2017. The twenty-first century has seen significant changes in consultation and community involvement in planning. Changes to the environment in which community engagement exists include an increased legal requirement to consult; a renewed focus on ...

In some cases, the consultors’ voice is rarely heard in the discussions; in others clarifying the messages and stimulating the dialogue will be necessary to ensure an effective consultation. Determining to what extent monitoring should become involvement depends upon the following: Whether the consultation is successfully meeting the consultation objectives or whether intervention would ensure ...

It pays dividends for those running a consultation to have as clear as possible an understanding of the issues that will effect it before the consultation begins. In communications theory, an issue is usually described as, ‘an unsettled subject ready for debate or discussion’.  In a development consultation, this typically includes concerns about the site, ...

During the early stages of a consultation, when a strategy is put in place to determine the direction of the project, it will be necessary to consider whether you will allow people to respond anonymously. While anonymity has been shown to enable people to put forward their viewpoint without fear of repercussion, it could be ...

It goes without saying that local residents will be more positively engaged with a development team and less critical of it if their locality is kept clean and safe, and that they are provided with timely and adequate information should their daily lives be disrupted. The following tactics are all regarded as good practice in ...

What are the ‘right’ questions to ask in a consultation on a development proposal? Unsurprisingly, there is no ‘right’ answer!  Consultation can range from an issues-based exercise which encourages a wide range of ideas from its audience, to a referendum which invites residents to vote ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to a single idea.  Ideally a consultation ...

Penny Norton’s book Public Consultation and Community Involvement in Planning: a twenty-first century guide is complete and due for publication by Routledge in June 2017.

To receive our white paper, Tackling Apathy in Consultation please email ConsultOnline

There are literally 100s of consultation tactics and with the advent of online consultation that list is growing by the day. So here are some ideas to help you select the most appropriate tactics for your consultation. Accessibility – do the tactics selected give all sections of the community an opportunity to comment? Analysis – ...

There is an assumption that the media, specifically local newspapers, are naturally anti-development, that a newspaper will always champion the voice of the local resident over that of a corporate entity, and that bad news is more likely to make the headlines than good news. There is some truth in this, but this does not ...

Following the success of the online consultation service ConsultOnline, CommunitiesOnline is launched, providing and efficient and effective community relations service during consultation.