We have a crisis of civility in this country. Civility skills are not being taught or modelled at the federal level, and not in the mediums by which many citizens take in information about what is happening. In fact, in-civility is highlighted so frequently as “news” that it seems to have become the norm. That isn’t true yet, because a norm of incivility is war or anarchy, not a functioning democracy.
In my work supporting local governments, I see how this civility crisis has tainted what used to be even the most non-divisive conversations and weakened the working tools of our system while poisoning our most precious, and perhaps least appreciated asset—our ability to work together for the common good in the public realm. I am proud to witness how some local governments are tackling the crisis of civility head-on. I am proud to work with some boards that have decided they need to take time in a retreat to talk about how they interact with each other. Some of those have adopted Codes of Conduct. Making the effort to be civil isn’t rocket science, though, and doesn’t require adopting complex rules of procedure. It is closer to tools we learned in Kindergarten.
This post is a re-tread of a shorter narrative published in our NWCCOG August 2017 newsletter, and no less relevant one year later.
In a recent editorial “We are neighbors not enemies,” the Vail Daily praised Town of Gypsum Mayor Steve Carver, who did something quite unusual before a contentious hearing.
It was the developers’ second attempt in 2017 following a hearing Carver that later described as full of “hatred and unruly people that just didn’t start off good.” After 20 years as Mayor, he would know. That file was denied on a 3-3 split vote after several hearings. Unable to attend the particular meeting at which the split vote occurred, Carver, as owner of Big Steve’s Towing, was occupied on Vail Pass that winters night. He had time to reflect on how the public process. This summer, the developer returned after adjusting the project, reducing the density and town was poised for round two of public hearings. Mayor Carver heard the rhetoric around town before the hearings even began.
It should be duly noted that Mayor Carver is an ex-marine who is runs a very business-like meeting. After so many years of public meetings, his dedication to the community and his patience is beyond reproach. That said, he is not known for subtlety, especially for those who are disrespectful. He once told one of a regular gad-fly who complained repeatedly about the town’s street sweeping that if he wanted the streets cleaned more often than town did it he could “stick a broom up your ass and do cartwheels down the street.” It was a reply that ended that issue. There is a time to put people in their place, I suppose.
As background, the developer of the proposed project in Gypsum managed some very large, rental properties up the road in Avon from which some opponents were proud to have moved their families. It must have felt like moving away only to have all the baggage you left behind suddenly show up. Who can blame the frustration of those who have worked to get out of the poverty cycle of rental housing into home ownership only to have the rental company propose a project next door? The hard part about this for many in Gypsum was that those speaking up loudest were relatively new to Gypsum themselves in a Habitat for Humanity neighborhood, and speaking up as new homeowners alongside whom many in the community had worked to help give them “a hand up (not a hand out)” as Habitat supporter Jack Kemp used to say. The new wave of NIMBYism didn’t sit well with other residents of Gypsum, and the town itself which had a reputation of being very welcoming of new development.
The proposal provided an awkward moment. Carver, when interviewed said, “I told the crowd there would be no bad mouthing or cussing; don’t address the crowd, the developer or staff, address the council.”
“In short, the lines were drawn and the meeting was ripe for confrontation,” noted the Daily, but before the hearing started, the 4 term Mayor did something he had never done before. He asked the crowd to take 5 minutes, stand up, walk around and introduce yourselves to your neighbors. It was a subtle move, cutting the tension by reminding many of the time set aside in Church to share the peace with others. Suddenly both sides of the room were reminded that their opponents were mostly just fellow citizens, and it set the tone for respect and restraint.
Of course, those 5 minutes didn’t change the content of the concerns. What it did was absolutely re-frame the way people spoke to each other, and it did confirm one very important lesson for many who were setting foot in town hall for the first time—this was a place for a civil discussion.
Public hearings, the right to testify, the right to due process for an applicant in a transparent, public process are hallmarks of our civil society that get a regular workout in our local jurisdictions, yet on a national level, we seem unable to interact without name-calling. Community leaders have a golden opportunity to facilitate that increasingly rare thing—a civil discourse.
Learning to do so can take learning from painful experiences. How do we respect each other and the process when the decision has no right or wrong answer? Town Boards face many such decisions. The NWCCOG Council had a taste of that challenge recently in Grand Lake where they presided over a complex “208 water quality” hearing with a room filled with well-prepared residents whom showed up on behalf of a single outcome—clearer water in Grand Lake—with widely varying opinions about the course of action to best achieve that outcome. That particular hearing was centered by hours of informational testimony about the science and the complex rule-making process. Just a thorough job of road-mapping set the tone that no one was trying to railroad the hearing.
Civility is a question contemplated by the City of Craig Mayor Jim Ponikvar who spoke at the 2017 Colorado Municipal League (CML) conference about how desperately his community needed to “changed the culture and the conversation,” which they did through an extended public conversation about an ironic book called Thirteen Ways to Kill a Community, by Doug Griffiths and Kelly Clemmer. Like many places in “coal country,” Craig has been hit hard by changes to the marketplace, by the national shift to clean energy. Coal power plants that supply many jobs are being shut down. Feelings about the changes have impacted many households, and impacted the tone of conversations in town hall. Mayor Ponikvar is a well-respected, long-time business owner in Craig and he has made civility a top focus. He had experienced the downward spiral of incivility and vowed with his board and other town leaders to reverse it, knowing that the future of his town depended on it. He recently shared with me a resource he refers to regularly—nine basic guidelines of civility–from The Civility Project.
What do Mayor Ponikvar’s guidelines and Mayor Carver’s action have in common—they show a leader who respects the public commons, respects the process and respects the people involved who understands the importance of establishing the public realm as a civil place to set the table for discourse on important decisions.
In Gypsum, Carver’s 5 Minute Method provided a coup de grace to incivility at one hearing. With the tone of the conversation nationally at fever pitch in social media and in places like Charlottesville, Virginia, navigating conversation toward civility may just be a local leaders’ most important role. I don’t think it is overly dramatic at this point in time to say that the future of our democratic society depends on it.
How do you set your table for a civil discourse?
