The Phoenix Futures Forum

Retrospective Comments

"Public officials are usually very reluctant to convene a process unless they can control it and own its outcome. A remarkable thing about Terry Goddard's approach, and the aspect of the program that was quite new in the country, was that a mayor was willing to convene the process, use the bully pulpit of his office to bring people to the table, and then step back and let them make decisions about their community as fellow citizens in the faith that democracy works. A second remarkable thing that he did was to insist that thousands of citizens be involved, not this the usual roomful of special interest stakeholders. After Phoenix, many American cities opened their doors wider to citizen participation. Before the Forum, it was common for a city vision planning group to involve about eighty people. If you suggested that hundreds or thousands of people should be involved, elected leaders would look at you as if you were nuts. When the first major meeting of the Phoenix Futures Forum was held, droves of people arrived to participate. They arrived by Mercedes and bicycles, wheelchairs and buses. We filled the largest meeting room at the Phoenix Civic Plaza. It was clear that people cared and wanted to work together--people of every color and economic group were sitting together and talking in a way they had never done before."

"I still think about the feeling of being in those rooms, even now, nearly ten years later. In those moments, it really felt like our community for the first time. We were sharing ideas and our vision for a great city--it was a wonderful feeling."

--Kathleen Eaton 1997

"Every time I hear the name of the Futures Forum I feel good about what we did. It was hard for me to attend the meetings, as I had to ride the bus and I had other demands on my time. But it was the first time all of us as a community sat down together to try to make the city a better place. We were working from the grass roots, and people like me from south Phoenix were meeting with people from across the Valley, making friends, telling it like it is. I brought my own style in, of course, and let people know what children need and what parents need in my area. The networking was so important. We need to do it more, because we have lots of problems to iron out, and we can do it. We have problems with poverty and homelessness, campaign financing, jobs, transportation. We need lots of economic opportunities in our neighborhoods--people are so depressed in poor neighborhoods and if I can sit across the table from you, you might have a better understanding of what I see every day. We can work these things out. We know how to discuss our problems and find solutions."

--Carolyn Lowery 1997

"In terms of what we were trying to achieve with villages, the Paradise Valley Village Council and the Sunnyslope Village Alliance are good models to look at. We probably need a charter amendment to devolve more decision-making powers to village councils, and we should add some at-large members to the City Council."

--Rod Engelen 1997

 "Had I still been at the paper five years after the Peirce Report, we would have had a big follow-up and an attempt to regionalize Valley planning. I think we might have persuaded the Morrison Institute or MAG to take it on as an annual event, with leadership sessions and a full-page report card in the paper, with checkboxes to tick-off what had been accomplished and what remained."

 "Most of what is going on now in the way of electronic connectivity between education and government, and most ot the long-range planning between education, business and government, is the product of community brainstorming in the Futures Forum."

"In looking back at the Forum, the missing piece was getting Forum participants elected to Council. The community's power structure was at the Forum table, but it was not there in heart. Power responds to power, and the Forum needed Council votes if it wanted the attention and participation of those interests."

"As hard as Terry Goddard tried to let the Forum have its own life--stepping back to let it generate its own leadership structure--it was inevitably identified with him very closely. When he stepped down, the sound of the process deflating was audible. It was not Paul Johnson's program. He supported the implementation of its recommendations throughout city hall, but, in terms of large-scale public participation, that was over."

"Before the Futures Forum, Phoenix neighborhoods, with a few exceptions like Sunnyslope and Arcadia, really didn't have any distinct identity. The Futures Forum, by suggesting that neighborhoods be named, provided with signage, and supported with special service, really boosted the quality of neighborhood life and the camaraderie of residents. It has been a dramatic change."

"The more I think about it, the more I think it was a fundamental gathering, with no ticket for admission required. The reality of any organizing effort is thatThe longer I am in public policy, the more conscious I am of the probability that I do not 'think' up anything new--I merely advance the schedule over what it otherwise might be. The crystallization of ideas through a vehicle such as the Futures Forum is very important in that it advances the schedule greatly. To pass something to soon before its time usually doesn't accomplish a damn thing. To move it up in the process, however, is a real accomplishment --a real impact to the system.

"Any new Forum-style effort should stay outside city government control. It should feature a large, annual convocation and update, like the Minnesota Citizens League, and should be structured with a chair, a chair-elect, a strong staff and a wide membership base. It should not become a shadow government--it should reinforce, not supplant, the government's role, and should be tailored to suit the kind of time citizens have to contribute. It will always be difficult to find the right formula in Phoenix, especially with so many newly-arriving citizens and business leaders. And of course you need strong leadership. Leadership is about the articulation of a vision. Without that, the city dies a death of a thousand cuts in the form of bad projects and more sprawl.

"Terry felt that we needed to strengthen the village concept, and that Phoenix needed a strategic view of its future and an emphasis on better planning. The Forum really was about those things. There was some initial discussion as to whether it should be a Phoenix 40-style effort, or grass roots. Terry opted for grass roots, with input from business and others as a part of the process. He trusted me to prevent the thing from becoming anarchy. And really, it was a wonderful time for our city."

"Zoning attorneys told us very candidly that their Phoenix projects were whatever they could get away with, and they could get away with building lower quality projects in Phoenix, compared to Scottsdale or Tempe. The Futures Forum became a vehicle for those who wanted better development guidelines for Phoenix. Quality developers and architects jumped in enthusiastically, as did Ron Short, the Planning Director of the City. Ultimately, when City Hall turned so heavily toward the laissez-faire development camp, that effort came unstuck, and Ron Short started putting out his resume. We have lost a lot of good public officials that way. And the process of citizen input changed almost overnight when Terry Goddard left--the door that he had been holding open just snapped shut again."

--Kay Jeffries 1997

"If we could ever get the grass roots community aligned with the power structure at the same time, something might really happen; some harmonic convergence."

--Charles Hill, City of Phoenix 1997