Local governments are often challenged to demonstrate their effectiveness and their relevance. They are also challenged by misinformation, disinformation, and apathy. They could use some help, and the help they need most could be with the relationships they have with their resident citizens, specifically with the connections they have to them.
Better connections can offer improved networking and greater transparency – information that is relevant to people’s lives and is accessible. This is what communities need and what governments can provide.
Local community governments should offer a formal risk-management process. Community risk management is performed by representatives of government departments who, in making decisions, compare the potential benefits and losses of proposals and report the assessment details as well as the results.
In its implementation, this program is a bit sneaky: just by creating a risk-management group, new relationships can form that help the local government become more responsive to community needs and more able to address social and economic changes as they occur.
It’s all about community-connecting – requiring only a change in how information is managed.