International Programs

Public Participation Tools

Facility Tours, such as this one in Belize, help citizens to understand environmental issues and projects.

There are a number of tools or techniques that you can use to implement your public participation process. These include in-person tools (those that involve face-to-face interaction – meetings or workshops, for example) and remote tools (those that do not involve face-to-face interaction – written surveys or websites, for example). This tools section is organized around the fundamental purpose of the tool:

Tools to Inform the Public -- techniques that you can use to provide members of the public with the information they need to understand the project and decision process
Tools to Generate and Obtain Input -- techniques that you can use to obtain public input to the decision process
Tools for Consensus Building and Agreement-Seeking – techniques that you can use to bring diverse groups of stakeholders together to engage in shared learning and decision making.

Each tools page includes questions to consider when selecting a tool and a table of some available tools with information on situations and purposes for which each tool is best suited. Each tool listed in the table contains a link to tipsheet or outside resource that provides a description of the tool, advantages and challenges associated with the tool, and principles for successful planning.

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Contacts

For additional information on EPA's Public Participation Guide, contact:

Shereen Kandil
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Office of International and Tribal Affairs (2650R)
1200 Pennsylvania Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20460
E-mail: kandil.shereen@epa.gov

Public Participation Tools

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