RID is a citizen research / reasoning organization aiming at collecting, curating, and advocating for policies that will improve the lives of our residents.

We strive to help our government make informed decisions, assuming the welfare of the majority of residents is the criteria for a good policy. Our research AND position papers will be sourced / cited and publicly available for any to read.

Facts matter, and it is critical to show your work.

• Advocate for the best outcome for most residents
• Conduct research around policy questions
• Curate research from citizen contributors
• Marshal background research to provide facts and solid arguments before our local government
• Provide web presence that makes research and arguments accessible to decisionmakers

• Citizen-driven: Citizens ask the questions, conduct the research, curate the results, and present before the government
• Provide a point person to present RID point of view during city commission meetings
• Provide advocacy in Facebook comments / other social media venues
• Advocate for RID positions in newspaper op-eds, other media
• Collect research on specific questions underlying policies being considered, curated topically
• Domain Experts - experts on a topic who oversee research creation and curation
• Potential collaborations:
  • Connect with universities to broaden our research
  • Connect with other local advocacy groups to broaden research and coordinate work
• Organizational activities:
  • Conversations prompting and during research is private to the group
  • All research published under CC-BY-SA 4.0 license, for anyone to read
  • Feedback centralized to email / similar to moderate trolling activities
• Provide materials containing web links whenever representing the group in public
• Research presented for veto in the group
  • RID Guiding Council can override veto on recommendation of Domain Expert

• RID Guiding Council - determines research / advocacy strategy for the group, and handles disputes
• Citizen Contributor - ANY of the following:
  • Asks research questions
  • Conducts research
  • Curates background research by topic
  • Marshals research to address any government policy under consideration
  • Presents research / arguments in government meetings
  • Promotes research / arguments in social media settings

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.