Title
Peak Democracy - Town Hall Meeting
History
Founded in 2007, Peak Democracy, Inc. is the most widely used online public engagement platform for government entities, with 2,500 open town hall forums, reaching over 300,000 constituents. The California-based company has worked with over 100 government agencies in the United States, Canada and Australia, accommodating municipalities ranging in sizes of under 2,000 to 8 million residents.
On August 26, 2015, staff previewed the Peak Democracy virtual town hall website. The village is seeking this online format to further strengthen civic engagement on pertinent topics affecting all residents. This format allows the village to maintain control of public engagement, by focusing on feedback from constituents while ensuring the dialogue is civil and legal. Potential topics include IDOT’s LaGrange Road widening, the mayor’s Open Lands Commission, water rates and upcoming village developments - including the 2016 ribbon cutting of U of C Center for Advanced Care. Topics will be chosen with the input from the Board of Trustees and the Community Engagement Committee.
Peak Democracy will provide the village with one Town Hall Portal and grant administrative access to an unlimited amount of designated employees. This cloud-based government online forum can be implemented through the village’s website or through a dedicated website domain established by the village. Peak Democracy provides network bandwidth and will host the village’s service on our server.
The Public Information Office will receive training via web conferencing, and Peak Democracy will provide the village with best practices for government online forums. In addition, the PIO will receive support in crafting topic content, as well as help marketing topics via press release, social media, email blasts and mailers.
Once the community forum is launched and topics posted, Peak Democracy monitors user registrations and posted content. All users on the ...
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