California Department of Mental Health

Consensus Planning Group developed and implemented a comprehensive bilingual public participation program for the State of California in support of its effort to identify a site for a locked mental health treatment facility for persons being held under the Sexually Violent Predator Act.

The program objectives included maintaining the viability of each potential community through the environmental process, determining community concerns and ensuring that they were incorporated into the project planning process, presenting project objectives clearly, and disseminating accurate, easy-to-understand information.

Consensus Planning Group worked with the client to identify the people and organizations that were interested in, and potentially affected by, the proposed project. Project issues were identified, cataloged and presented for review. Open-house workshops were planned in each potential community and fact sheets were prepared on community issues.

Eventually the project was viewed as an asset to the community and approved with community support.

Top