Room for sharing and working together
Place to share ideas and move beyond ideas
Edmonton – several thousands followers
-not just retweet news
-actually answer people back
City of Tacoma – answer peole back
Twitter- Austin – only allow followers…not responses…part of policy
-Comm actually tweets…but from department to comm…
-Comm team – YouTube and handle
-FB team – sending out info that is immediate…
-If consider news – not exactly soc media but more traditional approach
-Work w/ planning
Is that a lot of work? New work?
-layoffs and position removed…do we have bandwidth…
-start w/ burst of energy and then die off?
Supposed to be doing outreach…Just one new way of doing it. Relief. Touch couple hundred people via social media vs 50 people in public hearing/townhall….So much more rewarding.
Drives a lot of fear over lack of control. What if someone says something nasty back.
On Facebook, not anonymous so tens to be more constructive platform.
TSA blog allows comments. tsa.com/blog. The actual number
Less reporters covering local govt now. Twitter is replacing local news covering. More success on stories
Digital has to be one part of strategy. Additional part of strategy.
Planners are required to do public outreach. They have to do it in multiple ways anyways. Created new role – position.
Hold public workshops. Spend 3 hours. 1 hour of presenting. 2 hours of people yelling back. Wrong people in room. Resource intensive. People still complaining that we didn’t
Edmonton has a lot of great success stories. People just pull iphones and read comments from Twitter and actually take the questions and comments.
Lots of Twitter…as easy way in.
City of Edmonton Twitter account is administrative and not political.
Elected officials use their own names.
Transient…
Local govies – Categories, Parks, Communication, Strategies
Creating network and incentives…
Outside in and tell what’s valuable…and what more…almost more journalist. Best practice. Example. Homework assignments…1-2 people. Almost journalist capability…
Where do I go to look to get information and best practices…and share…get rewards…
Openmuni….partnering with code for america…
Moving target…lots of ones come and gone…
What’s your elevator pitch? Have them truly compare it and see how it works…Find people doing it right, get connected, and run like a campaign.
The spirit here in Edmonton from the City administration’s perspective is all about sharing. Open Data is definitely a movement. The data catalogue is out, GIS data being released shortly for free and innovation being injected into IT processes. Truly awesome. Our public transit iPhone app is of course leveraging this Open Data as well. (Route 411 and we’re expanding it’s capabilities. Once an admin gets behind this it really creates massive momentum that benefits all citizens, it’s very cool to be a part of.