Get Real Grassroots Or Astroturf Campaign?
Billed as a nonpartisan effort to gather community input and consensus on what city and county services residents value most, and how far they’d go to support them as local governments look to cut budgets, the “Get Real 2011” initiative this week kicked off what organizers hope will be a series of public forums and workshops to be held at locations scattered across Charlotte-Mecklenburg.
While advocates for the Get Real campaign contend it’s designed simply as a means for the public’s collective voice to be heard, offering feedback and providing help and guidance to elected officials as they struggle with tough budget choices, questions are being raised about possible conflicts of interest and ulterior motives.
Get Real 2011 is spearheaded by Crossroads Charlotte, a special initiative of the Foundation For The Carolinas and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Yet myriad agencies and organizations affiliated with Crossroads Charlotte receive direct and substantial funding from city and county governments.
Crossroads Charlotte, for example, is managed by the Community Building Initiative, a group that has received more than a half-million dollars of taxpayer funding over the last four years through budgets approved by both the Charlotte City Council and the Mecklenburg Board of County Commissioners.
Agencies and organizations counted as groups active with Crossroads Charlotte, many involved directly with Get Real 2011 – from the Arts & Science Council, the Latin American Coalition and Center City Partners to WTVI, the Community Relations Committee, International House, and Centralina Council of Governments – have collectively received millions of dollars in taxpayer funding, typically through budgets approved by the city council and board of commissioners.
The very same elected officials, in other words, that Get Real 2011 will be providing with input, guidance and information concerning community consensus on what services, and by extension service providers, are most valued. Service providers, for example, like the Latin American Coalition, which over the last two years has received nearly $150,000 in county funding and will likely be asking for more this year.
“I think it [Get Real 2011] has the potential to become a sophisticated way to preserve funding for some of these agencies and programs,” said Mecklenburg Commissioner Neil Cooksey, a Republican, “and a stealth way for some of these same agencies to build support for a tax increase.”
Annetta Watkins-Foard, Community Building Initiative program manager for Crossroads Charlotte, said Get Real 2011 is geared more toward providing residents with the opportunity to have their voices heard, rather than focusing specifically on funding levels for particular programs, services or agencies.
“We’re not advocating for one thing or another,” Watkins-Foard said.
The Community Building Initiative, she said, is not directly involved with establishing content and objectives for Get Real 2011. The agency’s primary relationship with Crossroads Charlotte as program manager, she said, deals with organizational and logistical aspects of initiatives launched by Crossroads Charlotte. She referred questions specific to Get Real 2011 to be directed to Tracy Russ, executive director of Crossroads Charlotte.
Russ did not return calls for comment, but according to Crossroads Charlotte’s website, “Get Real 2011 is non-partisan, non-profit and does not endorse or advocate for any viewpoint, policy, group, solution or answer…the point is to involve as many people as possible in voicing their views.”
Throughout this month, organizations from civic clubs and faith groups to homeowners associations and PTAs are being encouraged to host what Get Real 2011 leaders hope will be upwards of 100 small-group workshops, where participants will use materials and information provided by Crossroads Charlotte to foster debate. For meetings that draw more than 20 people, Crossroads Charlotte is recruiting and training facilitators to help discussion.
A sample from a Crossroads training packet describes how a trained facilitator can help workshop participants identify community values and priorities and options for moving forward:
“We’ve just identified service areas we think are most important and least important,” begins one portion of the training package.
“When times are tough, people must make sacrifices to make sure these priorities are supported. As leaders struggle to fund our priorities, there are three basic strategies they can use:
Option 1 – Raise revenue (taxes and fees) to match current spending
Option 2 – Reduce spending to match current revenue
Option 3 – Some combination of both Option 1 and Option 2”
The information and feedback gathered at the small-group community workshops will be presented at three larger public forums scheduled for next month, and ultimately forwarded to elected officials and community leaders for consideration.
City Councilmember James Mitchell, a Democrat, said he doesn’t see any potential for conflicts of interest stemming from Crossroads Charlotte’s initiative facilitating public debate.
“I think it sounds like a good way to get feedback from the whole community, and usually the only opportunity for that is at a public hearing for the budget,” Mitchell said. “We need to look at it as input that reflects the community’s priorities as it relates to spending the limited dollars we have.”
Cooksey offered a more guarded assessment of the Get Real effort.
“If it gives citizens the chance to provide us with unfiltered feedback, great,” Cooksey said. “But it needs to stick to promoting dialogue, without slipping into advocacy for particular programs or agencies. That’s where I see it running into problems.”
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