Description
Like an extended Chip Game process, Reality Check events bring citizens together in a workshop format to consider scenarios for growth and to define a vision for a community or region. While not specifically focused on identifying elements of character, Reality Check events focus on adding value and identifying strategies for protecting the most important elements of the community. Participants use Legos® and regional maps to consider alternatives, allocate growth and resources, and devise a vision for the future.
Steps
Citizens attending a Reality Check event sit at tables in groups of about 10 people and are guided through a discussion of planning and growth issues. Participants then use Legos® to allocate growth, new jobs and residents, and other attributes in future visions of the community (each Lego represents a certain number of jobs, housing units, people, or other attribute, as seen in Fig. 2.7.). After the workshop, organizers create a report that analyzes and collates results from each group. The report includes tools, recommendations, indicators, trends, and visions for the region.
Pros and Cons
Reality Check is a fun, interactive way for people to get a sense of the region and an understanding of policy tradeoffs. As it gathers citizens together for a compact workshop, the process is a relatively quick way of gaining feedback from a large number of people. It does, however, require citizens to come to a meeting and give a block of time to the planning process.
Reality Check is more easily applicable to scenario development and evaluation (i.e. considering zoning changes, build out scenarios, or growth policies) than it is for visioning and the discovery of heart and soul. It has been used extensively for visioning processes in Maryland, though, and can be set up to evaluate scenarios and identify important elements for nearly any aspect of community planning.
Examples
Reality Check has been used in many cities and communities nationwide, including Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Sacramento, Utah, Texas, and Fredericksburg, VA. Maryland has evolved the process into Reality Check Plus, a statewide visioning exercise completed in 2006 and summarized in the final report, Today’s Vision, Tomorrow’s Reality. See Case Studies for more information.