UH Manoa Department of Urban and Regional Planning Research Highlight: Dr. Dan Milz, Spring 2020
This article highlights a project being conducted by Dr. Dan Milz of UH Manoa's Department of Urban and Regional Planning. Dr. Milz's project focuses on how Hawaii's planners are adapting to challenges COVID-19 poses for community engagement through the use of virtual participatory planning processes. Additional information on Dr. Milz and his project is provided below.
Dan Milz
Dan Milz is an Assistant Professor with a dual appointment in UH Manoa's Department of Urban and Regional Planning and the Matsunaga Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution. He teaches in the Environmental Planning and Sustainability Course Stream and in the Matsunaga Institute’s Conflict Resolution Certificate Program. Dr. Milz studies the science and politics of environmental planning by analyzing how people think about ecological systems as they make plans and propose new policies. His research agenda has three components. First, it investigates the cognitive aspects of practical environmental judgments in participatory settings to observe how stakeholders learn to make better plans. Second, he researches the role that data visualization tools play in supporting planning processes. Finally, he explores how professional facilitators help local stakeholders improve planning and policy outcomes. Dr. Milz has studied regional wastewater planning on Cape Cod, water supply planning in the Chicago region, community green infrastructure planning in urban neighborhoods, and stakeholder learning in community engagement processes.
Project Description
The spread of COVID-19 has thrown a wrench in the efforts of planners around the world to engage stakeholders in face-to-face meetings. In response, Dr. Dan Milz has started a new research project to study how practicing planners are adapting to these changing circumstances. Supported by funds from the College of Social Science’s COVID-19 Rapid Response Solutions initiative, the goal of this project is to learn from global efforts help improve our capacity to engage residents, stakeholders, and neighbors meaningfully even when we cannot all be in the same room. And, while the COVID-19 pandemic has created the underlying conditions, enhancing the State of Hawaiʻi’s ability to conduct remote community engagement processes and meetings transcends our present circumstances. What we learn from this research has the capability to improve inter-island engagement and deliberation, as well. This project is in its early stages but developing rapidly. Over the next several months, Dr. Milz will be interviewing practitioners who specialize in community engagement. Findings from these interviews will equip planners, government agents, elected officials, community organizers and others with the tools and techniques for conducting virtual participatory planning processes, during times of quarantine and physical distancing. At the same time, Dr. Milz will be working with colleagues at institutions across the United States to conduct a review of state level mandates regarding public meetings and hearings. This research will look at state-level mandates and a random selection of local reactions to those mandates in each state. The goal of this research is to characterize how communities are responding to the pandemic in ways that promote and sustain an open and transparent democracy. To meet the urgent need, results from these projects will be shared on an ongoing basis, and the bulk of the findings will be circulated later this summer. Of particular interest to chapter members, Dr. Milz will be developing a webinar for practitioners to share research findings and provide tips for best practices.
Questions regarding Dr. Milz's project can be directed to dmilz@hawaii.edu