Editorial: 1984 revisited? Open house -- insert sock

One of the most dearly held tenets of living in a democracy is that citizens have a right to speak out. Before major decisions are made, normally public hearings are held where people speak out, expecting that their views will be taken into consideration.

Usually the press attends public meetings, so citizens with concerns not only get to make a statement, but there is also the opportunity for coverage in the newspaper or on television.

Another vital role these meetings play, for activists, is that they get to listen to other people who bring up points others may not have considered. Afterwards people will exchange contact information that helps with organizing campaigns.

The public hearing process is one of the few things that levels the playing ground between ordinary concerned citizens and powerful big industries and the government agencies that, most of the time, do their bidding.

Prior to moving here, I lived on the Mississippi Coast in an area with a lot of heavy industry, and pressure to fill wetlands for development. In one case, I saw citizen organizing prevail in preventing a 500-acre wetland fill in a low-income African American neighborhood in Gulfport, even though three U.S. Senators pressured EPA to approve the permit.

Managed communication

After Hurricane Katrina, there was a disturbing change in the way hearings were managed. Instead of a traditional public hearing, agencies like the Mississippi Department of Transportation and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers would hold an "open house" usually lasting for several hours. We could write comments on a card, but there was little opportunity to find out what others thought of the project, and scant chance of press coverage.

In short, the agencies had found a way to pretend to take public comments while, instead, managing communication so they could go ahead with their pre-conceived agenda while muting pesky opposition efforts.

In 2007 a public hearing was held by the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ) on a permit application to "land farm" liquid wastes from Tyson chicken here in Carroll County. In this case, the room was filled to overflowing with people opposed to disposing of the liquid wastes because of fears that, because of the area's karst geology, this could easily lead to contamination of drinking waters.

At this hearing, instead of people being allowed to speak to the audience, they were directed behind a screen in a dark part of the room where they could make comments into a tape recorder. As stated in an opinion piece for the Lovely County Citizen at the time (see www.lovelycitizen.com/story/1286605.html..., this turned a "public" hearing into a "private" hearing.

The Delphi Technique

In this case, public opposition was so strong that Terra Renewal withdrew its permit application.

The type of strategy I witnessed in Mississippi and then at the ADEQ hearing is known as "the Delphi Management Technique." This results in "controlled" feedback that "minimizes bias created by dominant individuals." The intention is to "build consensus." 1984 anyone?

Beverly Eakman, author of Educating for the New World Order, said this technique preserves the illusion that there is "community participation in decision-making processes, while in fact lay citizens are being squeezed out."

"The goal of the Delphi Technique is to lead a targeted group of people to a predetermined outcome, while giving the illusion of taking public input and under the pretext of being accountable to the public," states the citizen group Informed Citizens of Reading.

CECC goes beyond Delphi

It appears Carroll Electric Cooperative Corp. (CECC) has gone one step farther than the Delphi Technique. Although it is a non-profit, member-owned cooperative, it doesn't even pretend to operate in a democratic fashion. Members are not allowed to attend board meetings or get full minutes of board meetings. Members are not allowed to speak or ask questions at the annual meeting. And bylaws have been rewritten so it's virtually impossible for members to nominate someone to the CECC board or put a resolution before CECC members.

While claiming they are spraying herbicides to save money, CECC board members (the only ones who get to decide who else is on the board) are compensated at more than $30,000 per year, and last year (not a good year for the economy!) handed the CEO a $100,000 per year pay raise. And a recent lawsuit alleges CEO is hoarding members' money for "unjust enrichment."

Spray not

Recent scientific research has shown herbicides can cause serious illnesses such as brain cancer, prostate cancer, kidney cancer, pancreatic cancer, leukemia, birth defects and fetal death. Northwest Arkansas is particularly vulnerable to pesticides showing up in the water supply because of karst formations -- that means contaminants spread on the ground seep into the water supply.

But CECC refuses to even listen to members at the annual meeting on these and other issues of great concern to environmental and human health.

We are willing to sacrifice the lives of Americans to preserve democracy. Are we also willing to stand up to sham democracy?

-- Becky Gillette