Democratizing Risk Management: Successful Public Involvement in Local Water Management Decisions

Abstract

This paper discusses a successful public involvement effort that addressed and resolved several highly controversial water management issues involving environmental and flood risks associated with an electrical generation facility in British Columbia. It begins with a discussion of concepts for designing public involvement, summarizing research that indicates why individuals and groups may find it difficult to make complex choices. Reasons for public involvement, and the range of current practices are discussed. Next, four principles for designing group decision process are outlined, emphasizing decision-aiding concepts that include "value-focused thinking" and "adaptive management." The next sections discuss the Alouette River Stakeholder Committee process in terms of objectives, participation, process, methods for structuring values and creating alternatives, information sources, and results. Discussion and conclusions complete the paper.

Evaluating the Quality of Structured Environmental Management Decisions

“…A short list of SDM applications includes their use for helping to clean up contaminated sites (12), set guidelines for water use by hydroelectric utilities (13), create estuarine management plans (14), and devise strategies for the protection of endangered species (15). In each of these cases, it was suggested that the use of some type of SDM approach helped to enhance the quality of the resulting decisions.…”

“…The modified SDM approach tested here was similar to methods applied practically (13,18) and identical to ones that have been the focus of recent experiments (10,19).…”

Testing Alternative Decision Approaches for Identifying Cleanup Priorities at Contaminated Sites

“…More meaningful participation is characterized by allowing nonexperts to more capably evaluate information and contribute in areas reflecting their own expertise (e.g., objectives relating to community stability and pride, quality of life, economic and recreation opportunities, and the like) (16). Moreover, structuring decisions in this way helps to address (and, in some cases, to resolve) issues of tradeoff avoidance because as the different attributes of a given alternative become more tractable, tradeoffs between them seem less objectionable.…”

“…The second approach also provides scientific data but, in addition, presents valuesoriented information that seeks to improve the ability of nonexpert participants to make difficult tradeoffs across a variety of technical and nontechnical concerns. This approach is modeled on several decision-aiding initiatives that emphasize value-focused techniques (8,15,16). Although the basic factual information conveyed to participants in the two conditions is identical (e.g., progress of the cleanup efforts and site characteristics, contamination levels, environmental and human health effects), both the form in which technical data is presented and the attention given to values-based decision aids for participants are quite different.…”

Risk communication, the West Nile virus epidemic, and bioterrorism: responding to the communication challenges posed by the intentional or unintentional release of a pathogen in an urban setting

“…3,7,10 Early risk communication research centered on debates about the health or environmental risks associated with waste disposal, toxic chemicals and heavy metals, air and water pollution, nuclear power, electric and magnetic fields, oil spills, food additives, radon in homes, and biotechnology. 2,[11][12][13][14][15][16][17] Little attention was paid to risks caused by exposure to pathogens or to health belief models developed for addressing personal risk-taking behavior (e.g., smoking, alcohol consumption, and drug addiction).…”