Local Government Consulting Services
Innovative Solutions for Positive Community Impact
At The Sparks Lab, we are committed to helping local government leaders deliver high-quality services at minimal cost to their communities. Our research-based approach can assist you in determining budget priorities, evaluate program information, enhance civic engagement, and meet policy goals.
Community Surveys
Community surveys are important tools for determining annual budget priorities and long-range strategic planning. Surveys allow for much broader base of public input (compared to other meetings) decision-makers can use to determine where to deploy resources.
Policy Analysis
Policy analysis can be used to understand policy/program effectiveness, make decisions between various solutions, or even to design pilot programs to field test new policy ideas.
Public Outreach and behavior change communications
Policy goals often contain an element of asking people to change their behavior, from reducing water consumption to achieving safer roadways for all. Using insights from the behavioral sciences, The Sparks Lab will tailor a communication strategy to the targeted community with measurable impacts.
Sustainability Planning
Many communities are including sustainability as part of their master plan or have a separate sustainability plan. The Sparks Lab uses a combination of surveys community surveys and focus groups to gain input from the community as to what sustainability goals are most important as well as their suggestions for how to achieve those goals. Additionally, the Sparks Lab leads workshops with stakeholders about research-based opportunities for municipalities to achieve their sustainability goals.
Civic Engagement
Communities thrive when multiple stakeholder groups come together to solve common problems. Facilitating productive conversation can be done through workshops known as deliberative dialogues.
Expert Grant Writing
The Sparks Lab assists with grant writing, especially around developing a literature review and plan for collecting data (if required by the grantee) to evaluate program effectiveness.