2014-09-16 Planning & Organisation Committee Agenda

PLANNING & ORGANISATION COMMITTEE MEETING AGENDA                             16 September 2014


“Public participation innovation. Council should agree on its targets in the IAP2 Public
Participation Spectrum, and adopt a role as a national leader in democratic reform and in
bringing the Noosa community inside the decision making process, with the advice and
support of the newDemocracy Foundation.”


newDemocracy Foundation Proposal

There has been an emergence of more community representative forms of engagement and
decision making in various parts of the world including Europe and America. The key
elements to the processes being employed are random selection of participants, the
provision of access to all relevant information needed for the participants to consider an
issue, and independently facilitated forums for dialogue.

In Australia, the newDemocracy Foundation (nDF) is an independent, non-partisan and not
for profit research organisation aiming to identify improvements to the democratic process.
The Foundation believes there is a better way to deliver democratic governance and that
people want to be participants in politics, not just polarised voters every 4 years.

nDF has worked on several innovative engagement processes with State and local
governments. On the basis of their track record of several successful case studies, the nDF
was approached to brief Councillors and senior staff on their methodology and was
subsequently requested to provide a proposal for Council’s consideration. The proposal
provides for the establishment of a community jury to consider and report on significant
community issues referred by Council. Council may request a recommendation, or
alternatively may advise that it will implement a recommendation which has a pre-
determined level of support.


Why use a community jury?

A key element of the community jury is that a representative group selected at random will
contribute to Council’s decisions. The term “jury” is used as people generally understand the
use of juries in a court process and the nDF process is very similar.

Some people will argue that the Council has been elected to make decisions so it is not
necessary to devolve it to people who have not been elected. It is accepted that for any
issue where Councillors have a clear view of the right decision for the community, and is
confident of acceptance by most of the community, then that decision should be taken by
Council without reference to this type of process. Complex or significant issues are
considered best suited to the community jury engagement technique.

The principles for operating a community jury include:
•    Participants are randomly selected by a trusted independent body;
•    All parties have a right to submit their view and request to appear before the jury;
•    The jury should receive a reasonable per diem payment for their time;
•    The jury should be given a pre-agreed level of authority for its participation;
•    Participants determine the length of time they need to complete their
     recommendations within agreed time frames; and
•    Participants have access to information and expertise.




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