Brews & Views on Thursday: Power of Deliberative Polling

HALF MOON BAY BREWING COMPANY PRESENTS
BREWS AND VIEWS ON FEBRUARY 2

“The Power of Deliberative Polling”

Free public forum welcomes key organizers of the What’s Next California project, James Fishkin and Zabrae Valentine, with moderator Lenny Mendonca,  Director of McKinsey and Company

What:
What’s Next California? — the first state-wide deliberative poll in California — was conducted in 2011 in an effort inform citizens about key public issues using television and public opinion polls in a new and constructive way.  This poll covered four basic areas: the initiative process, the Legislature, state/local relations and tax/fiscal issues. Thirty proposals were deliberated by a statewide scientific sample of 412 participants and their conclusions offered many surprises. A panel including key organizers of the project — James Fishkin of the Center for Deliberative Democracy at Stanford University and Zabrae Valentine of California Forward with moderator Lenny Mendonca Director, McKinsey & Company — will discuss the project process and findings.

Deliberative Polling®, developed by Dr. Fishkin, is a practice of public consultation that employs random samples of the citizenry to explore how opinions would change if they were more informed.

When:
Thursday, February 2, 2012
6 to 8 p.m.

Where:
Maverick’s Event Center
107 Broadway Ave.
Half Moon Bay, CA 94019

Cost: Admission and snacks are complimentary. Beer, wine, and other beverages will be available for sale at the event. Ten percent of the proceeds from all dinner sales at Half Moon Bay Brewing Company for this event will be donated to the Cabrillo Education Foundation.

For More Information:
Call 650-728-2739 or visit www.hmbbrewingco.com

Speaker Biographies:

James Fishkin
James S. Fishkin holds the Janet M. Peck Chair in International Communication at Stanford University where he is Professor of Communication and Professor of Political Science. He is also Director of Stanford’s Center for Deliberative Democracy and Chair of the Dept. of Communication.

Professor Fishkin received his B.A. from Yale in 1970 and holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from Yale as well as a second Ph.D. in Philosophy from Cambridge. He is the author of a number of books including Democracy and Deliberation: New Directions for Democratic Reform (1991), The Dialogue of Justice (1992 ), The Voice of the People: Public Opinion and Democracy (1995) and is the co-author of Deliberation Day (Yale Press, 2004). His most recent book When the People Speak: Deliberative Democracy and Public Consultation was published by Oxford University Press in fall 2009.

Professor Fishkin and his collaborators have conducted Deliberative Polls in the US, Britain, Australia, Denmark, Bulgaria, China, Greece and other countries. He has been a Visiting Fellow Commoner at Trinity College, Cambridge as well as a Fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford, a Fellow of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington and a Guggenheim Fellow.

Zabrae Valentine

Zabrae Valentine is deputy director of California Forward and executive director of California Forward’s sister organization, the California Forward Action Fund.
Prior to joining California Forward, Zabrae directed The Commonwealth Club of California’s Voices of Reform Project. VoR promoted civic discussion of issues related to California governance, provided policymakers and the public a variety of fora in which to discuss these issues, and promoted bipartisan recommendations for improving government accountability and performance. In 2007, Zabrae was part of a team that developed the strategic plan for California Forward in response to a request by several major California Foundations and she played a leading role in organizing and launching the new organization with Executive Director Jim Mayer.

Before joining the Commonwealth Club, Zabrae was a Senior Program Officer for the National Democratic Institute, working in Lilongwe, Malawi. While with NDI she provided training and technical assistance to Malawi Parliamentarians serving as chairs and vice chairs of the Malawi Parliament’s policy committees, as well as to representatives of civil society, in support of legislative and policy analysis and budget monitoring.
Prior to working for NDI, Zabrae was a Senior Legislative Aide to U.S. Senator Tom Daschle in Washington, D.C. Zabrae has a bachelor’s degree in political science from Grinnell College in Iowa and a master’s degree from the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy.

Moderator Biography:
Lenny Mendonca is a Director in the Washington D.C. and San Francisco offices of McKinsey & Company, a global management consulting firm.
Lenny is on the Shareholders’ Council of McKinsey (its board of directors) and for many years led the firm’s knowledge development efforts overseeing the McKinsey Global Institute and the firm’s communications, which includes the McKinsey Quarterly. His client work is focused on service to public sector organizations, and over the course of his career he has helped dozens of government, corporate, and nonprofit clients solve their most difficult management challenges.
Lenny has led several McKinsey research efforts. He has written and spoken extensively on globalization, productivity, economic development and competitiveness, corporate social responsibility, regulation, education, health care, financial services, and corporate strategy.

Lenny is the Chairman Emeritus of the Bay Area Council, Chairman of the Economic Institute of the Bay Area, and vice-chair of the Stanford Graduate School of Business Advisory Council. He serves on the boards of The New America Foundation, Common Cause, California Forward, the Bay Area Science and Innovation Consortium, Children Now, and The California Business for Educational Excellence Foundation. He is also a Trustee for the Committee for Economic Development.
He received his MBA and certificate in public management from the Stanford Graduate School of Business. He holds an AB, magna cum laude, in economics from Harvard College. Lenny lives on the Half Moon Bay coast, south of San Francisco, with his wife and two daughters, where he is the founder and owner of the Half Moon Bay Brewing Company.

ABOUT BREWS & VIEWS

Brews and Views is the Half Moon Bay Brewing Company’s regular speakers series that tackles public issues that affect us all, from the Coastside of California to Washington, DC. Started by Lenny Mendonca, the founder of the Brewing Company and director at McKinsey & Company, Brews and Views serves as both a free public forum and fundraiser for Coastside nonprofit organizations (ten percent of all dinner proceeds are donated to a local nonprofit after each event). Previous notable guests include renowned forecaster Paul Saffo, managing director of foresight at Discern Analytics; Charles Kolb, president of the Committee for Economic Development; Mike McCurry, former press secretary for President Bill Clinton; Carla Marinucci, San Francisco Chronicle’s political reporter; and California State Assemblyman Jerry Hill.

Previous Brews and Views are playing as a series on local television station, PCTV on Channel 27, Monday nights at 7pm.
For additional videos, visit HMB Media at http://www.youtube.com/user/HMBMediaProductions