I’m standing for election to Porirua City Council on the platform of community voice, environmental protection and financial sustainability.
However voice without listening is futile and disempowering. That why I’m trying different approaches to resident engagement as part of my campaign. The Council needs better ways of listen to its communities.
In early July, my campaigned opened a Polis poll, which is a dynamic, community-shaped online conversation designed to surface shared priorities and foster constructive debate. This form of wiki-poll is open to everyone and allows users to both submit their own ideas and to consider other people’s ideas. As seen in this selection of media stories, Polis has been successfully used in Aotearoa New Zealand and around the world.
So far, about 50 people have cast 1,300 votes on 53 statements (32 ‘seed’ statements and 19 added by users). Based on different voting patterns, Polis has identified 4 groups. This is likely to change as more people take part.
There is a high degree of consensus on the type of leadership people want for the city, cleaning up the harbour and holding polluters accountable for run-off into the harbour. The majority of participants prioritise investment in three waters infrastructure. So far there is a strong consensus in favour of Maori wards with a small cluster of people in favour of their abolishment.
The number of participants is still small, but growing every day. We encourage anyone with an interest in the future of the city to take part at https://www.moiralawler.nz.
Let’s practice our listening. While there are a range of views, identifying areas of common ground is a strong basis for progressing issues that we care about.