OFFICIAL SITE OF THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY

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Stakeholder Engagement

The SPC Plan Endorsement guidelines stress how critical it is for municipalities to use proactive and supportive outreach in planning. Sustained engagement of stakeholders, especially stakeholders within overburdened communities, is needed to develop an effective municipal Environmental Justice Action Plan. 

Municipalities should not assume that residents of overburdened communities will simply “turn out” at community meetings. Writing a formal engagement plan is a way for a municipality to think through how best to involve residents and community leaders, and it provides transparency and accountability in the process. 

Municipalities should undertake proactive community-wide engagement, but ensure their engagement plan focuses specifically on overburdened communities. This ensures ongoing engagement of populations that are most impacted by the content of the plan and often face barriers to participating in standard engagement opportunities.   

The two graphics below outline (1) the points when engagement should occur and how that engagement contributes to the municipal Environmental Justice Action Plan, and (2) the key elements of a written stakeholder engagement approach. [/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row equal_height=”yes”][vc_column][vc_column_text css=”.vc_custom_1664653707934{padding-top: 20px !important;padding-bottom: 20px !important;padding-left: 20px !important;background-color: #e2ebee !important;}”]VIEW AND DOWNLOAD A GUIDE TO STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT STRATEGIES

VIEW AND DOWNLOAD TIPS FOR DEVELOPING A STAKEHOLDER ENGAGEMENT PLAN[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row full_width=”stretch_row” css=”.vc_custom_1664381741430{background-color: #e2ebee !important;}”][vc_column][vc_column_text][/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row equal_height=”yes”][vc_column][vc_column_text]

Meeting Residents

The team developing the municipal Environmental Justice Action Plan should spend time in the municipality’s overburdened communities, meeting with residents and other community stakeholders, walking and biking through communities, and participating in tours and discussions with local leaders and community-based organizations.

In general, the team should locate trusted gathering places in the community where there are opportunities to formally and informally engage with residents and community leaders. The team can work collaboratively with trusted local community-based organizations to host “open houses” that allow community residents to join at their convenience and to discuss their perspectives on environmental burdens faced in the community. Other strategies can include meeting with leaders of:

• Local schools,
• Houses of worship,
• Social service agencies,
• “Anchor” institutions (such as a local hospital or federally qualified health center that may serve and/or support residents in overburdened communities).

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Conducting surveys

The team may want to conduct a community survey to better understand residents’ perceptions about environmental and public health burdens. Surveys, such as online surveys in which a link to a web-based survey is provided to the resident, can be useful in collecting information from a large population.

Conducting online surveys effectively, however, involves extensive planning, time and effort. Teams are encouraged to seriously consider if they have the capacity to undertake a well-planned survey, and consider whether the information they seek to collect can be gathered through direct engagement. If the team decides that a survey of residents is necessary, the box below provides some suggestions for survey development and administration.[/vc_column_text][vc_row_inner css=”.vc_custom_1664457599160{padding-top: 10px !important;padding-right: 20px !important;padding-bottom: 10px !important;padding-left: 20px !important;background-color: #e2ebee !important;}”][vc_column_inner][vc_column_text]

Tips for designing and conducting community-based surveys

1. Establish a goal. An initial online community-based survey as part of development of the Environmental Justice Action Plan should focus on hearing from residents about their perceptions about what factors cause environmental burdens and public health stressors to them and their community.
2. Engage leaders. Development of a community-based survey can benefit significantly from working with a team of community leaders to effectively frame and write the survey. Even more effective is if trusted, local community organizations assist with conducting outreach about the survey.
3. Indicate purpose. A community-based survey should be clear as to who is conducting the survey and why.
4. Keep it short. Ensuring that a community-based online survey takes no more than 10 minutes will expand participation. Making it clear upfront how long the survey will take is helpful as well.
5. Ensure cultural competence. The survey must be designed to be welcoming and accessible to all residents that may be taking it.
6. Test and test again. The best way to ensure that surveys will effectively collect information is to have a small group of typical respondents test the survey at least once to identify points of confusion, cultural competence, and needed area for greater clarity.
7. Offer incentives. There will be a greater response rate on community-based online surveys when some form of incentive is offered which may include prizes, gift cards, etc.
8. Offer results. When conducting community-based online surveys, the team should ensure that it specifies how any member of the community can learn the results of the survey.
9. Frame analytical results. The team is encouraged to present any survey results as a simple sampling of opinions and not as a definitive statement on environmental burdens in the community. The survey results should be framed as a gathering of input from a small sampling of residents who chose to take the survey and that the results add to other information gathering efforts of the team.
10. Communicate uncertainty. Most important: the survey results only portray the responses of people who chose to take the survey. There can be a wide gap of information if there is a small response rate and/or if only a certain set of the population takes the survey.

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Key concepts

Municipalities are also encouraged to understand the terms justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion, which are sometimes referred to as JEDI. Combined, JEDI principles can be a strong point of reference for municipal development of an Environmental Justice Action Plan.

Some additional concepts that may be helpful to the team in developing the Stakeholder Engagement Approach include:

• Residents of overburdened communities may face challenges that prevent them from participating in municipal planning and decision-making processes. They may be unwilling or unable to participate for multiple reasons: fear of public exposure (e.g., undocumented immigrants), lack of transportation or childcare, work commitments, health issues, stress, time constraints, family obligations, distrust of civic engagement, and others. Effective engagement requires removal of these barriers. Municipalities will want to consider things such as:
  • Are translation and interpretation services needed?
  • Are some residents more comfortable meeting in locations in their own communities rather than municipal offices?
  • Are childcare services needed?
  • Is a particular time of day or day of the week most conducive for residents of overburdened populations?
  • Are refreshments needed for busy residents who may be juggling family and work responsibilities while trying to be engaged in municipal environmental justice efforts?
  • Would a hybrid and/or virtual meeting approach be more amenable to some residents?

• Different strategies may be needed for different stakeholders. Engagement efforts for residents who do and not not reside in overburdened communities, as well as for other stakeholders such as businesses, anchor institutions, and local experts, may be very different from one another.
• Collaborating with trusted local community organizations can help engage populations that may not be involved in traditional municipal decision-making processes. Building relationships with organizations that have existing relationships with residents of overburdened communities is an important approach for municipalities to conduct effective engagement. Examples of these community organizations include schools, houses of workshop, Family Success Centers, and social service agencies.

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• Diversity is not the same as inclusion. Diversity ensures that “seats are added to the table” for residents that may not be involved in traditional decision-making efforts. Inclusion ensures that those residents have the support they need to meaningfully contribute to discussions. These concepts are relevant to development of the municipal Environmental Justice Action Plan: residents who have not been traditionally involved in civic processes and who reside in overburdened communities may need support. For example, newly involved residents may benefit from training on subjects such as the Municipal Land Use Law, finance and budgeting processes, environmental laws and regulations, and public health authorities.
• Engaging residents of overburdened communities may require new ways of thinking on the part of municipal officials. Residents of overburdened communities may offer solutions to environmental injustices that are different than how municipal officials view solutions; listening to the ideas of residents with open minds may lead to shared solutions. Engaging residents of overburdened communities may require additional time and resources, which should be accounted for at the outset of the process. Radical listening is the practice of learning from often-unheard voices on issues such as environmental justice which emphasizes listening without judgment and not putting the insights of a resident in traditional frames used by municipal decision-makers.

• Early, ongoing, and meaningful engagement with residents of overburdened communities on the part of facility owners and operators can lead to positive outcomes. Municipalities can look for ways to encourage, facilitate, and incent private facility owners and operators to directly engage residents of overburdened communities.

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