11/14/2012 - Minutes City of Tigard
Neighborhood Involvement Committee-
Minutes
MEETING DATE/TIME: Wednesday, November 14, 2012; 7:00 p.m.
MEETING LOCATION: Town Hall @a City Hall
13125 SW Hall Blvd., Tigard OR 97223
1. CALL TO ORDER
The meeting was called to order at 7:05 p.m. by the Chair.
2. ROLL CALL
Present: Chairman Basil Christopher, Bev Froude, Cathy Olson, Connie Ramaekers, Sue
Carver,Jeremy Audritsh
Staff: Joanne Bengtson
3. APPROVE AUGUST 15,2012 DRAFT MINUTES
Cathy motioned to accept the August 15 meeting minutes, Sue seconded - approved.
4. REVIEW REVISED BY-LAWS FOR COUNCIL APPROVAL
Committee members reviewed the final draft that contained the committee's revisions of
the Neighborhood Involvement Committee bylaws.
Jeremy asked about how we would advertise openings on the NIC. Joanne noted that we
could use the normal ways - Cityscape, Neighborhood Networks, and the press.
Basil asked for a motion to approve the revised bylaws for Council approval. Sue made the
motion and Cathy seconded the motion. Joanne will schedule them for Council adoption
and report the meeting date in case there is discussion.
5. SUGGESTIONS FOR COUNCIL GOAL SETTING
(What role should the neighborhood program play in connecting residents to the Councils goals
and activities? Is there a way to involve neighborhoods with achieving Councils goals?)
The committee members would like to see an increase in the amount of visibility the
program receives, starting with City Council. They suggested asking Councilors to take
turns providing web admins with a monthly message for the neighborhood web pages. It
could be an invitation to hear resident's communication ideas, a short bio, or a question on
a topic that frequently gets asked at Council meetings. Whatever they choose, the
committee would like to have a commitment of one message a month - either to the
neighborhood blog where they live or take turns sending a message to all of the web
admins for posting.
Neighborhood Involvement Committee MINUTES - 11/14/12
City of Tigard 1 13125 SW Hall Blvd., Tigard, OR 97223 1 503-718-2476 1 www.tigard-or.gov I Page 1 of 2
They would also suggest that the Mayor or Council promote the Neighborhood Network
program on camera at some point in their meeting. Anything they can do to raise
awareness of the program and increase community participation would be appreciated:
share a link, a community event that's posted on one of the neighborhood sites or
highlight a new web administrator or note when a neighborhood is looking for a new
admin.
These goals will be forwarded to Council for consideration at the January 10, 2013 Goal
Setting.
6. YEARLY WRITTEN REPORT TO COUNCIL ON THE NEIGHBORHOOD PROGRAM
a. SUCCESSES
Recruited new members from former Neighborhood Network Steering
Committees.
Found a sensitive way to address the newly-annexed River Terrace property
owners to bring them into the neighborhood program.
All websites are active.
Blog activity is increased in some areas - with increased visibility, others can
improve.
b. CHALLENGES
Program visibility. Making residents aware of all the possibilities has been the most
challenging item facing the Neighborhood program.
Increasing hits to each web page is part of program visibility.
c. ASPIRATIONS FOR THE COMING YEAR
Identify all the ways we envision community/neighborhood involvement.
Better manage the ways the city communicates with residents. How do residents
want to get involved? Public meetings, by serving on another committee or helping
plan community/neighborhood events?
Cathy and Jeremy noted that we should stick to the tried and true venues of
communicating (Facebook, Twitter, Websites, Blogs and Email) and once the
communication base is established we can venture out and try new technologies
(Digg, Pintrest, Ping, H15, Linkedln) and information portals.
7. OTHER
Next Meeting: February 20, 2013, 7 p.m., Library 2nd Floor Conference Room.
Basil requested a list of the city's Board & Committee/volunteer opportunities.
The discussion turned to increasing the connection between neighbors and their
web page. Suggestions included sending news on the topics that are coming before
Council, provide opportunities to get involved - including school district and
aquatic district volunteer openings.
8. ADJOURN Chair Christopher adjourned the meeting at 8:30 p.m.
_ Neighborhood Involvement Committee MINUTES - 11/14/12
City of Tigard 1 13125 SW Hall Blvd., Tigard, OR 97223 1 503-718-2476 1 www.tigard-or.gov I Page 2 of 2