Civic Engagement Builds Capacity for Health Departments

Darryl Booth, MBA, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Environmental Health, Accela
dbooth@accela.com

The phrase "civic engagement," which speaks to closing the circle of communications and accountability between government and its citizens and customers, is an important one. It's captivating to explore where government, and specifically health departments, could be more like Amazon, Uber, and FedEx. These are examples of businesses that engage frequently and well with their customers, thereby setting the expectations of our customers.

When we don't quite meet those expectations (e.g., by having a modern Web site that takes instant payments or an iPhone app for logging complaints, with GPS coordinates and glorious 12 megapixel images), the customer citizen forms a diminished opinion of our services. Even though we may not interact regularly, we all want a positive review.

But is civic engagement as relevant to environmental health as it is to public works, building and planning, or elected officials? ...

Read the Building Capacity Column in Full

CIVIC ENGAGEMENT BUILDS CAPACITY FOR HEALTH DEPARTMENTS (PDF)

Journal of Environmental Health
January/February 2016
Volume 78, No. 6