The Black Hills Pioneer notes that the Bureau of Reclamation recently decided to close the Belle Fourche Reservoir to off-road vehicles. BHP’s editors get the sense that the closure could have been avoided if locals had gotten off their phones and participated in face-to-face democracy:
At a second meeting, only 29 people attended and only 20 written comments were received. Little input was given during the entire process about the ORV area.
Thus, the decision to close it was made. Once the bureau’s plan is finalized and is released to the public, citizens have a 30- to 45-day period to read the bureau’s plan and send additional written comments back directly to the bureau.
In this instance, those opposed to the closure of the ORV area took to social media and tried to gather support through an online petition. But unfortunately this does little to sway the government as it is not an officially recognized way to provide input.
Conversely, attending public meetings and providing direct comments is greatly beneficial to the decision-making process [editorial, “Government by the People,” Black Hills Pioneer, 2019.09.21].
There is something contradictory about a blogger criticizing online activism, but my blogging has sharpened my awareness of the difference between complaining online and getting things done. Many people scratch their activist itch by clicking “Like” or “Retweet”, but social media stats don’t put initiatives or candidates on the ballot. And for Bureau of Reclamation members and other officials who, like me, don’t even read Facebook, the only way to make a difference is to contact those officials directly, by e-mail, paper mail, and face-to-face testimony at their public meetings.
Sometimes—most times—to make a difference, you have to go look your leaders and your fellow citizens in the eye.
Opinions are like….well, you know….everyone has one. Not a lot of people like to show it around, though.
I spent a lot of time and effort in my earlier life writing comments, attending public meetings, and cajoling others to pipe up. I’ve slowed down a bit in later life, but I’m about to start digging in to commenting on the EPA’s permitting of the underground injection control wells for the Dewey-Burdock uranium project in South Dakota. Because I have a lot of background in addressing these sorts of issues, it isn’t too heavy a lift to do for me.
It helps to know a little bit about what you are talking about, rather than just lifting up your tail and showing your opinions. The people who are reading or listening to your comments usually are experts on the subject you are commenting on. If you don’t know what you are talking about or have wildly speculative and emotional testimony, you may feel good about getting something off your chest, but you aren’t going to be advancing your side of the argument very far.
Just on the topic of off-road vehicles, the topic of the Pioneer article, the agencies have done quite a bit of research and work on erosion and damage to public resources due to such recreation. It is part of their duty under law to protect those resources. A bunch of people yammering about wanting to drive anywhere they goddam want is going to be counterproductive. You have to recognize facts and provide addition facts and alternatives that need to be considered.
Very interesting topic for discussion. You would sure think social media could rouse the troops to action, but they do have to get off the couch. It’s definitely necessary to know what impact you’re having or not having. This blog does attract lots of legislative readers, but the senseless bickering often found in the comment section doesn’t change minds and is not the real work of going to a meeting etc as you say. I was quite shocked to see our local newspaper recently suggest that Facebook was the best place to go for flood updates. What? Our local government wasn’t effectively disseminating information through their own website, text messages, nor through the paper or radio station. They thought they were doing a service using social media yet they weren’t reaching most people lots of unhappy campers back at your old stomping grounds.
That’s a really beautiful area out there and has great historical fishing, but I question the long term health of the water given the watershed goes through the dump (or vice versa). There are some nasty things buried in there from paint pellet byproducts to electronics waste and all manner of other things. Whether off road vehicles have access is not really something that I have an opinion on (I am still young enough I hike, so maybe that’s the reason).
Donald, I am inclined to agree that the Bureau of Reclamation likely has good expert analysis on the damage off-road vehicles do and justification for protecting the environment by limiting their use on public lands. Come on, folks: can’t y’all get out and enjoy nature on foot, or on nice fat-tire bicycle?
Hap, we do face a challenge now of figuring out how to reach everyone in a splintered media environment.
On the one hand, Facebook and Twitter do make it easy to publish instant updates with lots of content—links, audio, video. Being able to efficiently disseminate that info via social media saves time that officials can use to actually collect info, communicate with responders, and fill sandbags.
I wonder: what is the best emergency communication plan for a municipality? Could the city focus on posting updates on its website, then invite the newspaper and the radio station to post updates based on that information? But you’ll still need someone full-time on the phone at City Hall taking calls from non-Web folks looking for potentially life-saving information.
Cory – it’s time to build-out a municipally managed, regionally integrated Internet subnets that are managed not unlike other utilities (water comes to mind). NOT wireless .. FIBER.
Here’s some outstanding online activism, courtesy of South Dakota’s outstanding cartoonist, Marty Two Bulls:
https://www.gocomics.com/m2bulls/2019/09/23
The internet has an inherent credibility problem. One never knows who a poster is. Or if one poster is posting under multiple names. And the authenticity and reliability of the information is a serious problem. When the internet became available for students writing research papers, it became necessary for them to go through a process of establishing the validity of a source and further fact-checking information before it could be cited. In digitalizing printed materials, the process is prone to many kinds of errors.
I have participated in submitting information to hearing bodies by computer, but have had to go through an elaborate verification process to make the submission.
When a disaster (like the Jim River flood) hits Yankton on a weekend or holiday, Facebook is the only game in town for information. The newspaper and radio stations may update high school sports scores, but not road and bridge closures, school closures, Red Cross shelter locations, sandbagging locations or any other useful information. Every bit of official information came via Facebook. It took awhile to get it all in one place and weed out the rumors, but it got done. By the time the P&D finally hit the street on Monday, it was all old news.
Hap and Cathy both make the point that the Internet is great for some activities, especially instant public updates (assuming there’s no power outage, the phone towers don’t blow over, etc.) The Internet is great for getting information when we need it fast.
But publishing and consuming information is different from democratic participation and policymaking. As David notes, we need no authentication process to read info; we do need to know who’s participating in a real policymaking discussion.
Cory – “we do need to know who’s participating in a real policymaking discussion”
An Internet ID would help accredit an individual, and would likely prevent the kind of drive by character assassinations that we see on a regular basis.
That said, a pseudonymous system would be better. That way, ideas could be decoupled from individuals to prevent personal issues jading or degrading the adoption of a good idea. At the same time, slander/defamation could be researched and prosecuted accordingly with the proper precursors.
Otherwise, we might get drive-by idiots using the social credit score of an individual – clearly a bad way of evaluating the worth of a person – from submarining a good idea.
No, we cannot give the responsibility of reporting community information over to Facebook. Our municipalities must do this effectively, use multiple digital sources as well as physical means like the emergency alarm system (which wasn’t used) as well as pounding on doors. The police knew our town was flooding they drive around all night. They could create feeds to the newspaper, radio station, anyone else like Facebook who wants to pick it up, but in no way should citizens of a community be forced to get their information from a place in which they do not necessarily have access (older people) or wish to participate. Seventy percent are on Facebook but do those people really check it regularly and do those 30% not matter?
Something tells me that someone has figured-out a solution, and that a staunch, stubborn kind of goodness is at the heart of it all.