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City Council - 10/28/1997 - Workshop APPROVED MINUTES EDEN PRAIRIE CITY COUNCIL TUESDAY, OCTOBER 28, 1997 7:00 p.m. CITY CENTER CITY COUNCIL Training Room STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT/ 8080 Mitchell Road VISION 2001 COUNCILMEMBERS: Mayor Jean Harris, Councilmembers Sherry Butcher-Younghans, Ronald Case, Ross Thorfinnson Jr., and Nancy Tyra-Lukens CITY STAFF: City Manager Carl Jullie, Assistant City Manager Chris Enger, Director of Public Works Eugene Dietz, Director of Parks, Recreation and Natural Resources Bob Lambert,Director of Public Safety Jim Clark, Director of Human Resources and Community Services Natalie Swaggert,Assistant Finance Director Don Uram, Director of Assessing/1VIIS Steve Sinell,Communications Coordinator Terry Kucera, City Engineer Al Gray, Housing & Redevelopment Manager David Lindahl, Manager of Facilities Barb Cross, Environmental Coordinator Leslie Stovring,Manager of Parks Maintenance Stu Fox, Manager of Recreation Services Laurie Helling,Molly Koivumaki Police Department, and Recording Secretary Barbara Anderson GUEST PRESENTERS: Bill Morris and Diane Traxler, Decision Resources,Inc. I. CALL MEETING TO ORDER Mayor Harris called the meeting to order at 7:05 p.m. Enger commented the Strategic Management Process review for input into the Management Plan had been discussed by City Staff and the Council at length. The meeting was being held to get training for facilitators for the Community Forum which is scheduled to be held on Saturday,November 15, 1997. The goal of this forum is to create awareness throughout the community and to obtain citizen input on the direction the City should go. He reviewed the plan for the forum and how it will be run. He introduced Bill Morris and Diane Traxler of Decision Resources, Inc. to give a presentation on facilitator training in preparation for the Community Forum. H. OVERVIEW OF COMMUNITY FORUM PROGRAM Morris gave an overview of the program which will include discussion of what the Community Forum will involve and then breaking into focus groups to discuss these ideas. He will give a presentation on demographic trends in the City and the potential impacts the baby boomer generation will have on City services. They have surveyed mature cities within CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION MINUTES October 28, 1997 Page 2 the ring around the metro area and they have seen some significant changes in the way they expected things to go. Focus groups will have the most important part of this and that is where he would like to spend most of the time. He reviewed the process they used to select people for the focus groups. They plan to invite approximately 20-30 people each night to participate in the focus groups which would give them about 150 people that will actually come. Traxler outlined the process by which they were calling people and asking them to participate in the focus groups. Swaggert commented that the Chair and Vice-Chair of each Commission will also be invited to participate in the focus groups. Traxler stated when they contact prospective focus group members, they have a few questions that can be answered with a yes or no answer. They also have a structure for the focus groups to use during their discussions. Morris discussed what he termed"forward thinking"and noted that each focus group will have three generic leading questions,with two parts to each one. The first thing that will take place is "brainstorming" with all ideas being welcome, and these will be prioritized according to their importance by the group. Then the facilitators will summarize these ideas and move into generalities. This process will be repeated six times throughout the process. He emphasized that no censoring must occur; any feedback must be encouraging further responses from the group, and no critical comments could be made. M. EXPLANATION OF FACILITATOR ROLE Lead facilitators will be City Councilmembers, and Co-facilitators will be Department Heads,with two others assigned to each group to act as recorders. Lead facilitators will act as the discussion guides,keeping order and encouraging the group to speak up and share their ideas. The co-facilitators will be the"scribes"who write down the ideas on a large tablet or white board or whatever is available. Recorders will be present to provide expertise if needed as well as a transcript of what is going on in each group. Enger stated they will have fact bullets put together that will be available to these groups to help with the discussions. Morris stated facilitators must be non-threatening,friendly,encouraging people to share their opinions. He encouraged them to be sure there were not two or three people who would dominate the group. Discussion ensued regarding how many people to have in a group and various ways to break things down so they could have several more groups than were originally planned for if needed. Morris stated it was important to have all the facilitators, co-facilitators and recorders be open and friendly to all the people who participate to make them feel comfortable so they will open up and share their thoughts. The facilitators should offer absolutely no judgements, valuations or contributions; their job is to keep the focus going. Summarize ideas by giving people feedback and be sure what was written down was what the individual intended. Use summarization as a tool to bridge between topics. Discussion ensued regarding the function and differences between the scribe and the recorder. The recorder keeps a running transcript of what is going on and the scribe is noting major points on the white board. Video and audio taping were discussed, and Morris noted CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION MINUTES October 28, 1997 Page 3 . he did not usually recommend this be done because it adversely affected the comfort level of the group participants,and tended to put people off. With citizens and government issues they tend to stay away from this type of recording. Morris talked about silences that occur in groups and how some are okay, and some need to be dealt with. Traxler discussed potential problem participants and what can be done if they just show up. She concluded they may be present because this is a public meeting,but participation can be restricted to invitation only. If citizens determine they have a right to be heard they will need to be handled. They will need to decide what is going to be done if this should occur. If there are only three or four people who show up they could be invited to observe the proceedings,but told because this is a structured, scientific process,they may only observe. Discussion ensued and it was decided that this issue needed to be dealt with. Traxler discussed participant personality types and it was felt that because they are selecting a random sampling they should have most types. Random assignments will be made to each group and if people want to be in a different group they should be reminded that it is a random selection and they should participate in their assigned group. The format for records was discussed, and it was noted that both facilitators and recorders will have a script to follow. The transcript will follow the facilitator's script and the questions and responses should be together. It was felt that they all need to gather at the end of the sessions and have a time for the Mayor to thank everyone for their participation and discuss how the information will be used and disseminated. Traxler stated they usually send out a summary to everyone who participated. This will provide closure and let people know they have made a valuable contribution. Stipends were discussed, and Swaggert noted the form would be blind and no one would know who wished to retain their stipend and who wished to turn it back to the City. Discussion ensued regarding how the day would flow and Swaggert stated there would be an introduction in the Council Chambers and then the focus groups would come down into the atrium where there would be coffee, etc. and then go into their focus groups. It was determined that would work best because the Council Chambers was equipped to handle overheads or slides or other visual aids that might be used. The day was to be casual, and informal to make people feel as comfortable as possible. IV. OTHER BUSINESS There was no other business. V. ADJOURNMENT Mayor Harris adjourned the meeting at 8:450 p.m.