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HomeMy WebLinkAboutPP-Public_Information_Program_UpdatePublic Information Program Update Loralyn Spiro & Laura Keir April 12, 2019 Good morning Commissioners, staff and guests. We are pleased to present a public information program update for the MWMC. The last full update of the public information program occurred at the April, 2018 Commission meeting, and we also provided a brief update in January of this year. (Loralyn) 1 Achieve public awareness and understanding of the MWMC, the regional wastewater system, and MWMC’s objectives for maintaining water quality and a sustainable environment. Commission Goal – Key Outcome #5 The public information program is guided by the MWMC Communication Plan which was updated in late 2017, and particularly by the MWMC’s Commission Goal – Key Outcome #5 as part of the annual budget. (Loralyn) 2 Increase community understanding of the connection between well-managed wastewater services and a healthy local environment. Raise awareness of the MWMC as a leader in water resources management, specifically in wastewater treatment practices and expertise. Increase community understanding of how their behavior and practices affect the health of local waterways and what they can do to help protect our environment. Strengthen communications by evaluating the effectiveness of strategies/tactics implemented. Communications Plan – Four Strategies The MWMC Communications Plan contains four main strategies to reach the overall goal of increasing awareness of the MWMC and its role in the health and vitality of our community and environment. The strategies and tactics support the MWMC’s mission, vision and values statement. (Laura) 3 Path signage by WPCF: 2 new signs by multi-use path, on western and eastern ends of plant Help neighbors and visitors passing by to understand what the facility is, and build awareness of MWMC Replace old sign outside WPCF Tactic: Signage There are 20 different tactics in the MWMC Communications Plan that support those four strategies. We’re working on all of these, and today we’re going to highlight tactics that have had exciting developments over the past year, and some work that’s coming up. Additional signage around the wastewater treatment plant is a tactic that helps neighbors and others passing by to understand what the facility is and the wastewater services that MWMC provides. This sign (double sided) was installed in late March, on both the western and eastern ends of the treatment plant- outside the fence, by the multi-use path. They replace an older sign that is being removed. (Laura) 4 Roughly 3 presentations to community groups per year, most recently: Eugene Southtowne Rotary Club Rotary Club of Eugene Springfield Rotary Club Nearly 200 community members directly engaged Tactic: Community Presentations Over the past year, staff has provided presentations to three community groups in Eugene and Springfield (all Rotary clubs!). The presentation covers history and mission of MWMC, services we provide, how wastewater is cleaned, and what residents can do to prevent pollution. The speakers are Matt Stouder and Dave Breitenstein. In the past year, we’ve directly engaged almost 200 community members with these presentations. Audience members always have interesting questions as well as comments of appreciation for the wastewater services we provide. We will continue with a goal of 3 to 4 presentations per year. (Laura) 5 Tactic: Sponsorships The MWMC continues to include sponsorships as a tactic to build community awareness. The MWMC has sponsored EWEB’s Run to Stay Warm for 5 years now and will do so again this November. In 2018, there were almost 1,150 registered participants. The event has averaged 1,200 registered participants. The MWMC sponsorship covers the cost for port-a-potties at the event. Each port-a-potty had a flyer displayed in it to raise awareness about the MWMC in addition to having our logo on event materials and EWEB’s website and a banner displayed. The Run to Stay Warm event benefits EWEB’s Customer Care program to help income-eligible customers who are having a difficulty paying their utility bills. The MWMC has sponsored the Lane County Fair the past 3 years and will do so again in 2019. Attendance at the 2018 Fair was around 114,000 . The MWMC sponsorship covered the majority of the cost for port-a-potties at the event. Similarly to the Run to Stay Warm, each port-a-potty had a flyer displayed in it plus our logo was on event materials and the Fair’s website. As part of our 2019 sponsorship package, we will also have a booth at the Fair (next to SUB/EWEB), will be a stop on the Fair’s Scavenger hunt and provide promotional items as prizes, can have a selfie board just outside our booth, and receive 40 daily admission passes and 10 parking passes that will be randomly given away to those on the Commission and staff that express an interest in going. For several years, the MWMC has sponsored an informational table at the Lane County Home and Garden Show with other agencies that are part of the Lane Area Pollution Prevention Coalition, also known as P2C. At the 2019 event, the MWMC provided a supply of the FOG kits and other promotional items to hand out along with the new informational tri-cards created recently. Approximately more than 3,000 attendees stopped by the P2C table. The MWMC 4th sponsorship is for the McKenzie River Trust’s Get Outdoors Day event in June. The sponsorship included having our logo on event materials and MRT’s website, and an informational booth at the event. Eugene Wastewater Division staffed the booth and included a Cornhole game designed by them. Despite the very rainy weather, more than 500 community members attended vent was attended the 2018 event. We will sponsor this year’s event on June 1st. We have also added a couple more benefits to our sponsorship package including setting up our selfie station, social media highlights on MRT’s social media channels, inclusion of a promotional item in the event’s swag bag, and additional signage at event. (Loralyn) 6 Over 1,200 kids and adults toured MWMC facilities in 2018 Tours of Biosolids Management Facility & Biocycle Farm becoming more popular Tactic: Tours “I learned that our waste turns into trees.” We continue to provide tours of the wastewater treatment plant on a regular basis, most often to school groups from 5th grade up through college students with the occasional community group such as the U of O Continuing Education Program. A handful of tours were also given of the Biosolids Management Facility and Biocycle Farm, and these are becoming more popular. We have worked with BMF/operations staff to develop guidelines and a more standardized process for providing tours at the BMF. (Loralyn) 7 Tactic: Annual Report http://www.mwmcpartners.org/2018-annual-report/ The annual report has been fully digital now for the past 3 years and connects to content on the MWMC website we continually build out to encourage viewers to click through to learn more about projects, programs, and accomplishments. Let’s take a quick look now at the 2018 Annual Report. (Loralyn) 8 Renewable Natural Gas Recycled Water Demonstration Project Owosso Bridge Closure Poplar Harvest Tactic: Project Communications Support We provide communications support on a number of MWMC project. For the Renewable Natural Gas (RNG) project, we are working in conjunction with partners such as NW Natural to let the community know about upcoming construction, how the RNG will be used, and safety measures. An open house for neighbors and other community members will likely be held this summer, before construction begins. Outreach for the recycled water demonstration project- which includes street tree watering in Eugene and uses at Delta Sand and Gravel- will be taking place over the next couple years. We are carefully crafting messages and starting outreach early to build support and community buy-in for additional future recycled water uses. Last November, we helped with the Owosso bike-pedestrian bridge closure that occurred for electrical repairs. We provided news releases, social media posts, communications with agency partners, and support on signage. (Laura) 9 Tactic: Social Media Total followers on each platform, to date: Facebook: 220 Twitter: 123 Instagram: 102 Follow @mwmcpartners on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter! The MWMC has been growing its social media presence since launching Facebook and Twitter accounts in summer 2017, and Instagram in summer 2018 (with help from our social media intern). Staff posts regularly with photos from MWMC facilities, staff, tours, etc.; various videos; pollution prevention tips; notice of Commission meetings; and more. There has been a positive response from community members and partner agencies, however growth in followers is slow; the digital marketing strategy is partly aimed at helping with this. We are continually working to increase both followers and engagement with our social media posts. (Laura) 10 Consultant assistance to develop and implement a digital marketing strategy, to increase community awareness of MWMC and promote pollution prevention behavior Selected consultant MIG, Inc. is starting to develop strategy now, and marketing will run on digital platforms locally this July through September Final push to move the needle of awareness of MWMC, before market research later this year Tactic: Digital Marketing Strategy Examples from MIG, Inc: An RFP for a digital marketing strategy was issued in February, and two proposals were submitted. MIG, Inc. was selected for the project, and the project kickoff meeting takes place next week. For this project, MIG will analyze the MWMC’s current digital marketing efforts, develop a new digital marketing strategy including target audiences, a media buy plan and schedule, and creative content. The digital advertising will run on local platforms this July through September. This could be in the form of paid social media posts, targeted online display advertising, or other means. We hope to increase the community’s awareness of the MWMC and our wastewater services, and build trust and positive perceptions. On this slide you can see a couple examples of MIG, Inc.’s work for other agencies. (Laura) 11 Second MWMC Community Survey: Request for Proposals – early summer 2019 Conduct Survey – fall 2019 Final Report – winter 2020 Tactic: Community Survey We conducted our first community survey in fall 2014 with the final report presented in winter 2015. The survey was conducted to learn what the community knew about the MWMC and their values around clean water. The survey results created a baseline of data, which was important to create for two reasons. First, to help create measurable objectives for the MWMC Communication Plan. Second, to help determine the success of the plan’s implemented strategies and tactics as each future community survey occurs. The current stated objectives for the Communication Plan are: Increase community awareness so that more than 30 percent of those surveyed are able to identify the MWMC; up from 18 percent. Increase initial favorable response regarding the MWMC to 25 percent; up from 14 percent. Improve community opinion regarding the MWMC’s performance by 10 percent with overall performance of 50 percent or better on all metrics; up from an average of 45 percent. We will be going out for Request for Proposals for our second MWMC Community Survey in early summer of this year, conduct the survey through focus groups and phone calls to continue to have qualitative and quantitative data, then report out the results to the Commission in winter 2020. (Loralyn) 12 State registration Federal registration Tactic: Branding An official tagline clearly, easily, and quickly lets the community know what our purpose is and the service we provide for having healthy community and environment. It also helps support the MWMC as being seen as an industry leader. Working with the MWMC legal counsel, we registered the verbiage “We Clean Water” as a trademark, and more specifically as our official tagline of the MWMC, at State level in 2018. However, at the Federal level we were given feedback that we needed to build out our trademark more to successfully register. Based on the feedback, we then worked with a graphic designer and produced the “We Clean Water” graphic seen on the screen. We successful resubmitted to the State and are waiting to hear back from the United States Trademark and Patent Office to learn if we have successful secured the trademark at the Federal level. This new graphic has been implemented on our social media channels, some promotional materials and is being used to complement the refreshed the MWMC logo that occurred in June, 2017. All these branding elements help convey our purposes. (Loralyn) 13 Tactic: Promotional Giveaway Items With more opportunities to handout information and materials through sponsorships, providing community presentations, and doing targeted pollution prevention education, we have increased our selection of promotional items that appeal to both adults and kids. This tactic continues to help increase overall community awareness of the MWMC and to help support pollution prevention education by providing information and tools to community members to help reduce pollution into the wastewater system. Most of the pieces contain the MWMC website address to encourage community members to learn more about the MWMC. We have a swag bag of promotional items for each of you. (Loralyn) 14 Thank you for the opportunity to present a public information program update. (Loralyn) 15