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5 Selection and Preparation of a Planning Group

Select and prepare the planning group to: work constructively together, represent the breadth of the community, have the power to make decisions or lend credibility with decision-makers, and add expertise and bridge-building.

POSSIBLE STRATEGIES

Engage a group of deliberators/planners who together:

  • Understand community viewpoints that need to be weighed,
  • Have the authority to decide or provide a connection to key decision-makers, such as city council, arts council, state-level officials, members of university board of trustees, donors, and nonprofit and foundation leaders,
  • Have the trust of the community and can help prepare the community for change, understanding, and involvement,
  • Bring needed expertise or have access to it,
  • Will work well together,
  • Are bridgebuilders among various identity groups,
  • As a group demonstrate that leaders take seriously improving the environment of the community, and
  • Have a sense of urgency about improving the environment.

Offer preparation for the group members. The training, resources, and staff support may improve the effectiveness of a group that includes members who may not be acquainted with all of the issues or accustomed to working on a similar group or in a public arena. Consider how best to accomplish these goals consistent with limitations imposed by public records and open meetings requirements.

Provide staff assistance to the deliberative planning group, so that these volunteers can carry out their duties effectively in a few hours per month.

IN MORE DETAIL

Public leaders may be tempted to appoint to a planning group those individuals who put themselves forward as movement leaders. But these persons may not have the respect of those whose viewpoints they would represent and may not be ready to exercise the skills required for a collaborative process conducted in open meetings and supported by a staff. The thoughtful choice and preparation of the chair as well as the individuals who will plan together can facilitate a more effective process.

Respected and thoughtful leaders of various parts of the community are asked to do many things in addition to serving on a planning committee. With careful design and provision for staff, members of the planning group will have to give only a few hours per month. The result may be that those most valuable to the planning may be willing to participate.

Sometimes a planning group already exists in the community and is willing to devote its time to symbols and public spaces, as illustrated below. If members have already developed relationships and ways of doing business that generated public trust, this approach might speed the planning.

ILLUSTRATIONS

Using an ongoing group

Oregon Consensus, based at Portland State University, is a platform for communities to use an array of approaches, including deliberation and examining the trade-offs inherent in public decisions. By engaging with members from all different walks of the community, Oregon Consensus can surface areas where community members hold different values, often tied to symbols, and then convey that information to political leaders. Through deliberative democracy, some of Oregon Consensus’s projects have looked at how school boundaries, political boundaries, transportation centers, and housing developments may not only raise practical questions but also highly emotional ones as well.[1]

Deep Dive: Jacksonville, Florida

In Jacksonville, leaders invited a local foundation and a trusted nonprofit to help design and facilitate a process that began with gathering concerns and led to a series of small-group forums. Their experience illustrates how involving credible partners and preparing a representative planning group—equipped with historical context and clear discussion frameworks—can strengthen legitimacy and improve the quality of engagement.

After the 2017 Charlottesville, Virginia, “Unite the Right” march and tragedy, more communities began to debate the presence of Confederate monuments in their public spaces. In 2017, a Jacksonville, Florida, city official called for the removal of Confederate monuments from public spaces and coordinated with a nonprofit organization to design a deliberative process to consider what to do with the city’s monuments and public spaces. The primary targets of this conversation were a Confederate soldier statue in Hemming Park (named after a Confederate veteran) and a monument in Confederate Park commemorating the Civil War contribution of Confederate women.

Process designers took a unique approach, starting with engaging the community in a concern-gathering feedback opportunity. Using multiple forums and platforms, they were able to collect several hundred responses. It was determined that most responses could be grouped into a few representative points of view. At the same time, a University of North Florida history professor prepared a report, concluding, “If the history of Confederate monuments tells us anything, it is that the dominant narratives about the meaning of the Civil War depends on who wields political power in the South at a given time. This pattern seems to hold true for Jacksonville as well.”[2]

Community leaders, supported by a local foundation, then invited local citizens to join a series of sixteen (16) small-group deliberative forums focused on how monuments and public spaces would be used to define their city. To assist this conversation, leaders created a guide for the community discussions titled How should we convey the history of Jacksonville? Monuments, Parks, & People.[3] Among other things, the document proposed three options for the community to consider and identified ground rules for the discussion. The guide was made to avoid a simple two-sided solution such as “keep the monuments” or “take down the monuments.” The three options were (1) Value Jacksonville history with monuments and plaques, (2) Change public space, and (3) Leave the monuments as they are; recognize Jacksonville African American history.

Options to Discuss
Considerations
Value Jacksonville History with Monuments and Plaques (1) How to tell Jacksonville’s whole story?

(2) How to give meaning and hope to Jacksonville’s current residents?

(3) What could be done to make Jacksonville’s public spaces more inclusive?

(4) Who could provide historical context?

Change Public Space (1) Should public parks and spaces be changed?

(2) Are there ways to use these spaces differently to support Jacksonville’s current residents?

Leave the Monuments Where They Are and Recognize Jacksonville African American History (1) What will it take to recognize Jacksonville African American History?

(2) How can Jacksonville transform into a city of courage and compassion?

(3) Are there specific ways that the community can work together toward these ends?

By opening a dialogue, offering suggestions, and asking reflection questions, leaders encouraged participants in the deliberative forums to engage in positive and constructive discussion about a potentially contentious community topic. The discussion that ensued was more inclusive of different viewpoints and allowed community members to be heard and consider alternative points of view. In 2018, Jacksonville published a report outlining the findings from the deliberative process, which broadened the conversation beyond protecting or attacking monuments.[4]

Outcomes of the deliberative process include the development of a local history curricula for use in secondary schools, creation of an interactive StoryMap, Re-thinking Jacksonville’s Confederate Monuments, discussion of forming a truth and reconciliation process to grapple with its complicated history, and the transformation of public spaces to be more inclusive.[5] In 2020, the mayor ordered city workers to remove the statue of a Confederate soldier in Hemming Park, which was renamed James Weldon Johnson Park, memorializing the Jacksonville born African American writer and civil rights activist. The mayor also committed to a process for the removal of other monuments in Jacksonville. In 2023, after several years of ongoing negotiation, the next mayor removed the memorial to Confederate women and changed the name of Confederate Park to Springfield Park. Since then, several other cities have adopted structured, facilitated forums to explore public symbols—reflecting the influence of Jacksonville’s emphasis on transparent process and inclusive participation.

 


  1. Oregon's Kitchen Table, https://www.oregonskitchentable.org/.
  2. James B. Crooks, “Confederate Monuments: Whose History?,” document delivered to the Jesse Ball duPont Fund, Jacksonville, 2018, 17.
  3. “How Should We Convey the History of Jacksonville? Monuments, Parks, & People,” Issues Forum: Jacksonville, (Jesse Ball duPont Fund, 2018), https://www.nifi.org/sites/default/files/regional-issue-guide-downloads/How%20Should%20We%20Convey%20Jacksonville%20History.pdf.
  4. “A Report on Dialogue Forums: How Should We Convey the History of Jacksonville? Monuments, Parks, & People,” Issues Forum: Jacksonville, (Jesse Ball duPont Fund, April 24, 2018), https://www.nifi.org/sites/default/files/report-downloads/Issues%20Forum%20Jacksonville%20FINAL.pdf.
  5. “Re-thinking Jacksonville’s Confederate Monuments,” ArcGIS StoryMaps, https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/6736d4f598eb4b09ae01768b09b69c8a.

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Symbols and Public Spaces Amid Division Copyright © 2025 by Divided Community Project is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.