Community Engagement

Mar 30
6 min read

Updated: 2 days ago

Start Date: 5/25/25

Why the Office of the City Auditor (OCA) did this project

This audit was conducted to determine the extent to which the City of Tulsa uses community engagement to inform decisions that address the needs of residents.

Project Scope

Establish the current maturity level of community engagement across all departments within the City of Tulsa. Evaluations of the Office of the City Auditor, Office of the Mayor, and Office of the City Council, were not included.

Why audit this topic?

Community Engagement is widely recognized as a best practice for shaping city policies and programs that reflect the needs and values of the people they serve.

Project Procedures

Develop a self-assessment questionnaire to assess the City of Tulsa’s community engagement maturity level as Rudimentary, Intermediate, or Mature.
Develop a scorecard for evaluating results of self-assessment.
Facilitate completion of self-assessment with each City department.
Classify departments as service (primary customers are residents) or support (primary customers are other City departments).
Determine the City of Tulsa’s community engagement maturity level based on service department self-assessment scores.
Analyze results to identify improvement opportunities.

Key Observations

The City’s overall maturity level for citizen engagement is Mature according to self-assessment.
According to self-assessment, there are improvement opportunities in the following areas:
- Defining and measuring success for community engagements.
- Incorporating input from residents when determining scope and topics for engagements.
- Providing enough information to make it easy for residents to contribute meaningfully during engagements.
- Inviting community groups and volunteer organizations to participate, when relevant, in engagement efforts.
- Proactively seeking engagement from underrepresented groups for community engagements.

Audit Objective

Document the City’s baseline maturity level for community engagement.

Survey Overview

Using the Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Initiative as a guide, we developed a self-assessment questionnaire for department directors. The assessment consisted of 18 inquiries designed to answer four over-arching questions about City of Tulsa’s community engagement processes.

Do we have concrete, compelling purposes with transparent goals for engagement efforts?
Do we communicate with clarity about the subject, scope and level of effort required for the engagements?
Do we have equitable community representation and meaningful departmental representation?
Do we use tools and methods optimized for functionality, accessibility, and inclusiveness?

Answers to each inquiry were scored as Rudimentary, Intermediate or Mature.

RUDIMENTARY	City officials rarely think or talk about civic engagement beyond the legal requirements and consider public problem-solving a task of government employees.
INTERMEDIATE	City officials regularly think and talk about civic engagement but often struggle to design and manage efforts in a way that residents and government entities alike perceive as effective.
MATURE	City officials consistently think and talk about civic engagement, design engagements with intentionality, and consistently monitor and evaluate engagement efforts to learn and improve. Many residents feel that city government is their partner in making city work, and vice versa.

Methodology

We conducted interviews and facilitated self-assessments with department directors of seventeen departments.

Ten of the departments provide services directly to residents and seven of the departments provide support services. Assessment results include scores for the ten service departments. Service department scores were averaged by question and department to determine the City of Tulsa’s overall maturity score. Self-Assessments were analyzed for improvement opportunities.

Summary of Results

Overall, City of Tulsa engages the community at a mature level according to self-assessment.

Departments demonstrate a high level of coordination in supporting each other in engagement efforts as well as a strong desire to provide services with high levels of quality and desirability.

Highlights

Do we have a concrete, compelling purpose with transparent goals for engagement efforts?

Seven departments scored themselves mature and three departments scored themselves intermediate for this question.

Strengths:

Setting engagement goals and incorporating citizen input into policy development, decision-making and service delivery.

Improvement Opportunities:

Defining and measuring success for community engagement
- Four departments identified this as an area for needed improvement.

Do we communicate with clarity about the subject, scope and level of effort for the engagement?

Seven departments scored themselves mature and three departments scored themselves intermediate for this question.

Strengths:

Continuously seeking ways to increase community involvement despite barriers.
Using subject matter experts and data to develop engagement scope and topics.

Improvement Opportunities:

Incorporating input from residents when determining scope and topics for engagements.
Providing enough information to make it easy for residents to contribute meaningfully during engagements.

Do we have equitable community representation and meaningful departmental representation?

Nine departments scored themselves mature and one department scored itself intermediate for this question.

Strengths:

Demonstrating value of community engagement through direct participation of department directors and high-level managers, and employing staff with specific community engagement responsibilities.

Improvement Opportunities:

Inviting community groups and volunteer organizations to participate, when relevant, in engagement efforts.
Proactively seeking engagement from underrepresented groups for community engagements.

Do we use tools and methods optimized for functionality, accessibility and inclusiveness?

Eight departments scored themselves mature and two departments scored themselves intermediate for this question.

Strengths:

Collaborating with other departments in community engagement efforts.
Using a diverse set of technological, traditional, and creative approaches for various engagement activities.

Improvement Opportunities:

Ensuring invitations to community engagements are clear and specific as to what is being expected or requested of residents.
Requesting feedback on community engagement efforts and communicating outcomes to participants and residents.

Support Departments

Support departments facilitate and improve community engagement efforts through activities such as translation services, marketing, information sharing, technology support and security services.
The Finance Department is a support department, but its Grants Division conducts community engagement activities to comply with mandates for grants from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
Parks, Culture and Recreation is a service department which sometimes acts as a support department by providing meeting and activity space for community engagements.