Minutes 01-31-2014 - Laserfiche WebLink

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• Wired local schools • High-speed Internet access Todd McGee said he believes the environment in Orange County is ripe to succeed with a communications plan. Todd McGee said that a few months ago NACIO did a webinar for members that walked them through writing a communications plan. He said his slides at the bottom of page 7 and on page 8 of the handout borrow liberally from what was shared: • Take stock of internal elements — County Mission Statement — Existing Communications Plan — Board's adopted goals/strategic vision — Existing Communications Policies (social media) — Crisis Communications Plan — Existing Communications Channels Todd McGee noted the importance of a county's website as an existing channel not only to provide information to citizens, but also to learn (e.g. from statistics about page visits) about what kinds of information citizens are most interested in. Then a county might figure ways to feature that information more prominently. In response to a question from Commissioner Gordon, Todd McGee clarified that a "crisis communication plan" should be part of your overall communications plan. He said two choices are to either: take an existing plan and tweak it; or, start from scratch. If you decide to start from scratch, these are the elements that should be included. Michael Talbert noted that while doing research on this topic, he found an entity that had a full plan, but that decided to do a separate strategic communications plan around dealing with the great recession. He cited this as an example of an event in your community that may warrant something special. Todd McGee observed that a bond referendum such as the Commissioners discussed earlier in the day might be an example of that type of special event. Commissioner Price asked where a county typically puts a crisis communication plan. Todd McGee said that in an active crisis, it is important to have one speaker. Who that person is depends on the nature of the crisis (e.g. Sheriff, Emergency Management Director, Public Health Director). He said it is important to spread the word through as many channels as possible. • Take stock of external elements — Identify Partners — Survey Citizens — Local media • Set goals and objectives — Tie goals to mission and values — Objectives should be specific and measurable — Determine strategies for each goal Rod Visser asked if Commissioners had any further questions about things that Todd McGee had specifically addressed in his presentation, or did not address.