by Melanie Speir, Civil Discourse Team

On March 22, the Board of Supervisors unanimously passed Resolution 2022/73, the pledge to employ Civil Discourse developed and presented to them by the LWVDV Civil Discourse Team. The presentation was well received and the Supervisors expressed real public appreciation for our League.  

This was a real team effort. Everyone had a hand in determining how best to proceed. The team spent a year researching Civil Discourse resources, personally attending and vetting Civil Discourse programs, and meeting as a committee to determine what direction was appropriate for a Civil Discourse initiative. The League in San Luis Obispo very generously shared their research, materials, and experience creating successful Civil Discourse programs - our project is the beneficiary of this innovative League.  
 
Anne Granlund spearheaded our work with the Supervisors. Peggy Huston created our PowerPoint.  The whole committee and leadership team provided helpful input to our talking points and slides. Supervisor Diane Burgis deserves recognition for her support and initiative moving this resolution forward.  
 
We’re hoping to leverage Board of Supervisors support into more local publicity for Civil Discourse, and more invitations to share our talking points and slides with school boards, colleges, city councils, public agencies and more. Supervisor Burgis has suggested we make a presentation to the Council of Mayors.
 
We can supplement and back up these presentations with materials and resources, and with skilled facilitators who can offer a variety of local Civil Discourse-oriented workshops.
 
The team meets monthly on Zoom. Please contact me at civil.discourse [at] lwvdv.org if you’d like to join us - more participation and more volunteers would be great!