David Roach appeared before Parksville council recently, to update them the Citizen’s Forum progress.
He described the forum as “a group of like minded individuals and organizations sharing a commitment to creating a vibrant future for Parksville-Qualicum Beach and the surrounding communities.”
The group formed in 2009 to talk about collaboration as a preferred method of bringing diverse stakeholders together on complex issues.
Roach gave a detailed account of the progress to date including two community forum’s in 2010 and two workshops coming in March.
The group has been focused on five principles: stakeholder involvement, consensus building, process design, facilitation and group memory.
He said the groups sees a big community shift beginning to take place in the community.
A shift from special interest groups to shared interests and from top down decision making to shared decision making.
He is optimistic that society is shifting to a more collaborative approach, shifting the emphasis from power struggle to constructive conversation.
“It is transforming the civic culture of the region,” he said giving examples of ongoing work on local official community plans, the urgent and primary health care centre and issues around the possible closure of Kwalikum Secondary School.
“Collaboration is breaking out all over, and that’s a good thing,” he said.
The next workshops are March 8 and 29, the first focusing on the individual attributes needed to be a good collaborator, the second on the group attributes.
For more information or to register contact admin@sosd69.com or 250-248-2093, extension 227.