Mayor's Community Drop-In
From 2016 to early 2020, Mayor Lisa Helps held monthly community drop-in discussions at local venues and at City Hall. Due to the pandemic, these discussions were held virtually in 2020 and 2021.
Background
"In Community: The Structure of Belonging Peter Block writes that “the leader is held to three tasks: to shift the context in which people gather, to name the debate through powerful questions, and to listen rather than advocate, defend or provide answers.” This is the spirit in which I’m piloting a new format of the mayor’s regular time with the public.
As Mayor, I want members of the public to have the opportunity to drop in and see me. It’s also important for me that people have an opportunity to meet others, engage in conversation, and share thoughts, ideas and concerns, and to build community and a sense of belonging.
To this end, I have been holding my regular time with the public as a community conversation rather than a series of 10 minute one-on-one meetings, as has been done in the past. This allows me to hear your hopes, ideas and concerns for our city, but not in a vacuum. Others can chime in too. My experience is that the public has lots of wisdom, the ability to make connections, and to help come up with solutions. I’ll take notes and make sure that if you do have something that needs to be passed along to one of our operational departments or to Council for consideration, that’ll happen."
Lisa Helps, Victoria Mayor
250.661.2708
@lisahelps
