The Local Agenda 21 Planning Guide - Democrats Against UN ...

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The Local Agenda 21 Planning Guide Establish distinct Working Group structures under the supervision of the Stakeholder Group. Working Groups are given responsibility for each of the unique planning tasks, e.g., priority setting, issue analysis, visioning, action planning, implementation, etc. They may be established to focus on distinct issues, such as a Working Group on solid waste, housing, etc. STEP 4. Identify appropriate partners to participate in the Stakeholder Group and its Working Groups. STEP 5. Establish the terms of reference for the activities of each group, which includes defining the relationship between stakeholder planning and statutory processes, such as official development plans. STEP 6. Develop a common Community Vision to guide the entire planning process. Expanded comments on these six steps follow. 2.2.1 DETERMINE THE SCOPE OF PLANNING Planning is only valuable if it generates action. The first step in any planning exercise, therefore, should be to define the “theater of action”—the issues, places, and time periods for action. This theater of action, or scope of the planning effort, is usually determined by five factors: • the subject of concern (e.g., sustainable development in a comprehensive sense or a few specific priority service areas); • the geographic area for planning (e.g., neighborhood, city, or watershed); • the relevant jurisdictions (e.g., political, geographical, or service jurisdictions); • time (including both the urgency of the problem(s) addressed and the number of years to be covered by the final plan); and • the institutional and community resources available for planning activities. The first step in any planning exercise is to define the “theater of action.” These factors will ultimately determine how comprehensive or focused the planning effort will be. Stakeholders may decide that resources for planning are not adequate to effect a simultaneous review of the full range of development issues facing the local community. In this instance, the resulting planning approach would be designed to focus on a priority issue (to be determined) while simultaneously considering the impact of activities in other issue areas upon it. After considering the above factors and defining the theater of action, a mission statement for the planning effort should be prepared. This mission statement should include both goals and detailed objectives for planning. This information could be used to inform a larger group of stakeholders about the proposed planning effort. Such an educational campaign could be designed to facilitate stakeholder review of the mission statement. Feedback from this review could be used in defining the formal mandate for the Stakeholder Group that would oversee the planning effort. 2.2.2 CREATE THE STAKEHOLDER GROUP http://www.idrc.ca/openebooks/448-2/ (20 of 180)18/10/2010 12:47:23 AM
The Local Agenda 21 Planning Guide Partners are not ad hoc participants who occasionally share their opinions. On the contrary, they are expected to share responsibility for the planning process and its outcomes. Their involvement needs to be facilitated through an organizational mechanism. In the cases provided with this chapter, each municipality established special organizational structures to oversee the partnership planning process. For some, this coordinating mechanism was external to the municipality. For others, it was internal to the municipal institution. In Lancashire County, UK, an Environmental Forum was established to oversee and support their Local Agenda 21 effort. This Forum was made up of members from a broad range of stakeholder constituencies, including the municipality, and received staff support from a special municipal Environment Unit. The Environment Unit linked the Forum’s planning efforts to internal municipal planning processes. In Cajamarca, Peru, an Inter-Institutional Consensus-Building Committee made up of stakeholder representatives coordinated thematic working groups, public forums, and workshops to prepare and present project proposals to the Provincial Council. In Santos, Brazil, all of the municipal Councils developed action proposals for their distinct areas of concern. Each Council is directly linked with a municipal secretariat or department to which it communicates its recommendations. Cross-seating between members of the various Councils is arranged to permit exchange between sectors. In Johnstone Shire, Australia, a small municipal steering team provides the strategic vision and governs four theme-based stakeholder committees. These committees convene periodically to integrate their various planning activities. Coordinating bodies, or Stakeholder Groups, serve as the Boards of Directors for the planning effort and govern the planning process. The diversity and status of their stakeholder membership can provide both legitimacy and credibility to the planning effort. This broad-based membership can also facilitate the recruitment of participation from different sectors, the gathering of information, and the negotiation of agreements on controversial issues. It can build consensus on a strategic community vision, make final reviews of action plans, and hold the municipality and other implementing agencies accountable to agreed upon plans. In the case of both Lancashire and Cajamarca, the governing Stakeholder Groups were given direct mandates from their respective municipalities. Whatever the scope of the exercise, a clear mandate and authorization from the local government provides both democratic accountability and a close link with the official planning activities of government. This mandate should specify the roles and responsibilities of the Stakeholder Group. It should define what planning is to be undertaken, how results and recommendations will be reviewed by the municipality and other key institutions, and how the results will be used in statutory planning efforts, such as annual budgeting or development and structure plans. Municipalities throughout the world are establishing special organizational structures, generally called “Stakeholder Groups” to oversee their partnership planning process. 2.2.3 DESIGN WORKING GROUPS Because a sustainable development planning process involves a variety of activities, the Stakeholder Group will most likely wish to form partner-based organizational structures to implement the distinct elements of the planning process. The ambitious planning efforts in Lancashire, Santos, Cajamarca, and Johnstone Shire are designed to address a full array of local issues. In order to facilitate the participation of people from different disciplines, backgrounds, sectors, and levels of expertise in discussing these issues, the Stakeholder Groups established a variety of specialized Working Groups. These Working Groups undertook the distinct tasks of issue identification, problem analysis, technical research, priority setting, action planning and impact analysis, implementation and monitoring, and evaluation and feedback. Some structures were used to collect and analyze information or to develop action proposals; others were used to integrate action proposals with municipal plans; and still others were used to develop performance indicators and to evaluate progress in achieving targets. http://www.idrc.ca/openebooks/448-2/ (21 of 180)18/10/2010 12:47:23 AM
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