How to Change the World. Clare Feeney
and presentations to – contractors’ associations, engineering consultants, utility companies, land developers and the general public. They also made informal presentations to legislative committee members and received only one negative vote in the two-stage process of voting in the new legislation. This approach was so effective that not one member of the sectors affected submitted or testified against the regulation that would affect it. The continued success of Delaware’s program is a tribute to the consensus approach.
Similarly, the Focus Group set up in Auckland to inform the development of the Council’s erosion and sediment control training program was very active and helpful. It later became inactive for some time, but was subsequently revived in the form of the Industry Liaison Group because both the industry and the Council realized they needed a forum for ongoing dialogue.
Meeting three or four times a year, the Industry Liaison Group provides an invaluable communication forum, enabling informal discussion of opportunities for co-operation and of issues of concern. Brief reports on these meetings are sent out to the wider industry in an electronic newsletter.
As an example, in the early days, contractual issues (over which environmental regulators have no control) were debated, especially the need for consultants to properly schedule erosion and sediment controls in their tender documents to ensure that contractors got paid for their environmental protection work. This is an issue that bedevils the start of any new erosion and sediment control program and takes time and industry commitment to overcome.
Bear in mind, as we’ll see later, that your first partners are likely to be internal, and your program will involve ongoing work with both internal and external partners and other stakeholders.
Grant Crossett specialises in designing management systems for invasive pest animals and is a pest and predator control monitoring specialist32. When I met him at a recent international conference on education and training, he told me how he works closely with a wide range of stakeholders when preparing and delivering his programs. He was struck by my presentation because he’d never thought of how he worked as being ‘partnership’ – but it undoubtedly is. It’s just how he naturally goes about his work.
Having a conscious awareness that this is what he is doing can strengthen Grant’s working relationships still more.
Step 2: Research: building a robust case
Good research is the essential foundation of cost-effective environmental management programs. Routine monitoring can signal trends or changes that justify further targeted investigation and intervention; research can then be done into the effectiveness of actual or potential management methods and their effect on the environmental issue of concern.
Research helps you to define the issue, identify the environmental outcomes you want, identify the most cost-effective methods to achieve them, and frame all these in a way that enables their monitoring. It includes initial and ongoing research, and provides data to inform your program monitoring and evaluation.
To make the case for setting up Auckland’s erosion and sediment control program, Council staff had to carry out very robust initial research. They documented the local issue in terms of its existing and projected areal extent and environmental impacts. They then researched erosion and sediment control issues and management options in overseas jurisdictions. This information enabled them to build a case strong enough to justify setting up the program.
Ongoing research projects very specific to big construction sites that the Council has sponsored, funded or undertaken over the years include:
The Council also has an active scientific research program into (among other things) the effects of sediment runoff on freshwater and coastal ecosystems, sediment tracing and a host of other topics. These can be found by searching for ‘technical publications’ on the Council website33.
Thus, the efficiency of on-site control measures is continually assessed, while ongoing state of the environment monitoring aims to assess their overall effectiveness.
Step 3: Monitoring, evaluation and review
It is amazing – and disturbing – how many programs are set up in such a way that it’s not possible to evaluate them. I’ve scrutinized many a one, and it’s heartbreaking to tell people that the effectiveness of their program can’t be evaluated because of fundamental flaws in their plans and a lack of monitoring data.
By considering outcomes, objectives, monitoring, evaluation and program review UPFRONT in your program planning, you’re more likely to set up your program in the right way.
We did set objectives for our erosion and sediment control program and its training component – though with the benefit of 20:20:20 hindsight (20 points for each eye plus 20 years of experience!) I’d frame them differently now.
We have also conducted evaluations from time to time and I’ll talk about what we did and what we found in Chapter 6. In Chapter 6 I’ll also talk about how to set up your overall program and your training using a program logic approach that will ensure their outcomes and effectiveness can be evaluated.
Step 4: Policy, regulation and enforcement: a management framework
The Council’s erosion and sediment control program was set up within a legislative context that was changed within a very short time with the introduction of the Resource Management Act in 1991. In one way, this was fortunate: a body of research had been built up and practical experience had been gained on the ground with regulation of the construction sector, and these informed the development of the new policy instruments provided by the new legislation.
The new act required each regional council to prepare two key policy instruments: a Regional Policy Statement