Citizen Surveys and Focus Groups: An Evaluation of Two Citizen Involvement Techniques in Natural Hazard Mitigation Planning
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Date
2003-07-28T16:03:41Z
Authors
Mitchell, Krista M.
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Abstract
The drastic rise in the cost of responding to and recovering from disasters in recent decades
has promoted a movement towards planning for disasters before they occur. Mitigation
planning, as this concept is know, has become increasingly important to local jurisdictions
thanks to the passage of the Disaster Mitigation Act of 2000, which requires a jurisdiction to
have an adopted mitigation plan in order to be eligible for certain hazard mitigation grant
programs. An important component of the new regulation is the requirement of citizen
involvement. Citizen involvement has long been successful in the fields of community,
environmental, and transportation planning. There are a number of ways in which the public
can become involved in natural hazard mitigation planning. This paper outlines two of them:
citizen surveys and focus groups. This research focuses on the citizen involvement
techniques implemented as part of the City of Beaverton, Oregon’s development of a
Natural Hazard Mitigation Action Plan. The research provides insight on the outcomes of
both the citizen survey and focus groups that were implemented in Beaverton and provides
recommendations for the key players involved in involving citizens in natural hazard
mitigation planning processes.
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Keywords
Disaster planning, Citizen participation, Surveys, Hazard mitigation -- Planning