Dam Busters 201 Peer to Peer

In this session, participants were able to engage each other about the successes and pitfalls of community engagement. They worked with peers to answer questions and trade resources with the goal of enhancing community outreach for dam removal.

This session consisted of two sessions of breakout rooms. Each room focused on a single questions regarding community engagement. Find notes and discussion from each breakout room below.

Interactive Session Questions

Have you ever changed someone's perspective or had yours changed on a project? What happened? Why do you think it worked?
What are the most effective forms of different outreach you have done?
What kinds of attachments are most common around dam removals? How do you work with/deal with them differently? How are they the same?
How do you decide who is an interested party? How do you tailor outreach to different parties?

Breakout Session 1

Group 1: Have you ever changed someone's perspective or had yours changed on a project? What happened? Why do you think it worked?

Key Takeaways:

Having different ways of engaging with different speakers to communicate different messages is very effective
"It may be our 50th dam removal, but it might be a communities first dam removal" so coming in with humility is important
Before and after images and/or renderings are helpful

Group 2: What are the most effective forms of different outreach you have done?

Discussion/Key Takeaways:

Offer a variety of options for engagement. Site walks – great option for someone just looking to get more information. River cleanups – offers a positive way to help the resource and community and creates opportunities for conversations. Action parties – allow people to engage in supporting the dam removal – e.g. write editorials, send out postcards, make phone calls, etc.
What do you do when you have someone who is less engaged or skeptical? Create opportunities to listen, for example, offer to walk the site and hear concerns. Respond with curiosity. Get a sense if people are open to learning more. Find a time to connect and pull out maps or show in person how questions or concerns are being addressed. Find people who are well respected in the community, e.g. local historian, who can be the messenger.
Connect communities/dam owners who removed their dams with others who are thinking about removing their dam so they can ask questions about the process, things to consider, etc. Try to connect peer-to-peer, e.g. Town Administrator to Town Administrator, local historian to historical society, user groups, etc.
Takeaways:
Outreach can mean communication, engagement, education, or relationship-building.
Think about the message, messenger, timing and method to achieve effective outreach
Many options: public meetings, site walks, social media, local press, storytelling, school programs. Partner networks, 1:1 conversations, storytelling events, community art, river festivals, volunteer clean-ups, and pop-ups, etc.
Be creative! Always room for donning a Brook Trout Costume!

Group 3: What kinds of attachments are most common around dam removals? How do you work with/deal with them differently? How are they the same?

Key Takeaways:

The main types of attachments practitioners are seeing are historical, human impacts, emotional sentiment, and ecological worries
Addressing historical impacts by having some way of honoring the site and involving Indigenous communities on the longer historical perspectives
Addressing all types through local champions who are non-technical and can guide people through
Renderings and case studies to show other dam removals
Using analogies to describe technical elements
Approaching people with compassion

Group 4: How do you decide who is an interested party? How do you tailor outreach to different parties?

Key Takeaways:

Interested parties typically involve people in close proximity to the dam, but there are often people upstream and downstream, recreaters, tourists/short term visitors, and Indigenous communities who should also be considered
Having information in the physical area is also a great way to reach people who are near the dam often

Breakout Session 2

Group 1: How do you define success in regard to community engagement? Why is defining success important?

Key Takeaways:

Having local public support or seeing resistance fade away over time can be hard to measure but a metric of success
Wanting the community to be satisfied with the decision made and then act as champions for future projects
The scale of community engagement may be different between different types and sizes of dams

Group 2: How have you used your limited time engaging different community members and decision makers?

Key Takeaways:

Power Mapping can be a helpful tool to understand the level of support and types of interested parties
Meeting people where they are at
Host community events
Consider historic challenges and how to honor the history of the dam

Group 3: When do you start the community engagement process?

Key Takeaways:

While starting engagement early is important, make sure you consider what kind of information will be necessary in order to begin having conversations
It can be scary to talk about dam removal without having answers about topics like flooding impacts or water level changes
Treat early engagement as an information gathering stage, without bringing in removal right away

Group 4: Take a look at this image showing the “levels” of community engagement. A lot of presentation-style meetings focus on sharing information. How can we incorporate additional “levels”, and when might it (if ever) not be possible?

Key Takeaways:

Meaningful engagement goes beyond information-sharing. these other levels — Consult, Involve, Collaborate, and Community-Led — that can build stronger relationships and better outcomes
Examples of ways to shift from Informational into the Consult and Involve activities – listening sessions, co-design workshops/charettes, site walks, story maps, small-group meetings/focus groups
As you move up the levels of engagement, especially in the Collaborate and Community -Led levels, more time, capacity and buy-in are required. What makes these levels of engagement possible include things like trust, shared ownership of the decisions or process, capacity support.
There are instances where the higher levels of engagement may not be possible or unrealistic. For example, privately owned dam, safety or regulatory constraints, urgent dam safety issues, limited capacity, or lack of local interest.
Think about who your community champions are that will carry the project through and help to support long-term stewardship of the resource post-dam removal, could be conservation, recreational focused, etc.
Build trust and transparency even the process stays closer to the Inform and Consult levels – early communication, regular updates, setting clear expectations about what’s flexible and what’s not (e.g. ecological standards, permitting timelines), and sharing how the project fits into the larger community and watershed context in the present and future (e.g. all rivers transport sediment, erode, and flood on occasion whether the dam is there or not)

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Dam Busters 201

Peer-to-Peer Support for Community Engagement

Interactive Session Questions

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Breakout Session 1

Group 1: Have you ever changed someone's perspective or had yours changed on a project? What happened? Why do you think it worked?

Key Takeaways:

Having different ways of engaging with different speakers to communicate different messages is very effective

"It may be our 50th dam removal, but it might be a communities first dam removal" so coming in with humility is important

Before and after images and/or renderings are helpful

Group 2: What are the most effective forms of different outreach you have done?

Discussion/Key Takeaways:

Group 3: What kinds of attachments are most common around dam removals? How do you work with/deal with them differently? How are they the same?

Key Takeaways:

The main types of attachments practitioners are seeing are historical, human impacts, emotional sentiment, and ecological worries

Addressing historical impacts by having some way of honoring the site and involving Indigenous communities on the longer historical perspectives

Addressing all types through local champions who are non-technical and can guide people through

Renderings and case studies to show other dam removals

Using analogies to describe technical elements

Approaching people with compassion

Group 4: How do you decide who is an interested party? How do you tailor outreach to different parties?

Key Takeaways:

Interested parties typically involve people in close proximity to the dam, but there are often people upstream and downstream, recreaters, tourists/short term visitors, and Indigenous communities who should also be considered

Having information in the physical area is also a great way to reach people who are near the dam often

Breakout Session 2

Group 1: How do you define success in regard to community engagement? Why is defining success important?

Key Takeaways:

Having local public support or seeing resistance fade away over time can be hard to measure but a metric of success

Wanting the community to be satisfied with the decision made and then act as champions for future projects

The scale of community engagement may be different between different types and sizes of dams

Group 2: How have you used your limited time engaging different community members and decision makers?

Key Takeaways:

Power Mapping can be a helpful tool to understand the level of support and types of interested parties

Meeting people where they are at

Host community events

Consider historic challenges and how to honor the history of the dam

Group 3: When do you start the community engagement process?

Key Takeaways:

While starting engagement early is important, make sure you consider what kind of information will be necessary in order to begin having conversations

It can be scary to talk about dam removal without having answers about topics like flooding impacts or water level changes

Treat early engagement as an information gathering stage, without bringing in removal right away

Group 4: Take a look at this image showing the “levels” of community engagement. A lot of presentation-style meetings focus on sharing information. How can we incorporate additional “levels”, and when might it (if ever) not be possible?

Key Takeaways:

Meaningful engagement goes beyond information-sharing. these other levels — Consult, Involve, Collaborate, and Community-Led — that can build stronger relationships and better outcomes

Examples of ways to shift from Informational into the Consult and Involve activities – listening sessions, co-design workshops/charettes, site walks, story maps, small-group meetings/focus groups

As you move up the levels of engagement, especially in the Collaborate and Community -Led levels, more time, capacity and buy-in are required. What makes these levels of engagement possible include things like trust, shared ownership of the decisions or process, capacity support.

There are instances where the higher levels of engagement may not be possible or unrealistic. For example, privately owned dam, safety or regulatory constraints, urgent dam safety issues, limited capacity, or lack of local interest.

Think about who your community champions are that will carry the project through and help to support long-term stewardship of the resource post-dam removal, could be conservation, recreational focused, etc.

Additional Resources

Dam Atlas- A guide for community decision making around historic dams