By Popular Demand "ss2.015"

CITIZEN JURIES

From the perspective of the Transportation Department, one of the virtues of the citizen conferences was that they were a quick and inexpensive method of public deliberation. By contrast, the inspiration behind the conferences was the citizen jury model, which uses a much more elaborate deliberative process.^[44] In a citizen jury, participant selection follows a carefully designed set of demographic and attitudinal quotas, deliberation takes place over four or five days, and sometimes regional juries select members for subsequent meetings.

The citizen jury process earned its name because it was "based on the analogy of a jury," as opposed to a public opinion poll, explains its founder, Ned Crosby. Just as juries can resolve criminal and civil disputes by hearing evidence and argument, deliberating, and presenting verdicts, so citizen juries go through the same stages to suggest resolutions to public policy problems. The Jefferson Center for New Democratic Processes, which Crosby founded, has conducted dozens of innovative citizen jury projects on a wide range of local, regional, and national issues, ranging from organ transplants to the federal budget.

A 1995 jury on hog farming in Rice County, Minnesota, is a good example of the citizen jury process. Faculty and students at Carleton and St. Olaf Colleges, with Crosby's assistance, designed a jury to address the contentious issue of how the county government should regulate the private large-volume pig feedlots common in the area. Speciflcally, the jurors answered six questions:

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What aspects of hog feedlots are beneflcial to, or appropriate for, Rice County?
What aspects of hog feedlots are detrimental to, or inappropriate for, Rice County?
Should hog production in Rice County be regulated? If so, how and why?
If hog production should be regulated in Rice County, should the number of animal units per farm be limited? If so, should the limit be 500, 750, or 1000 (or more) animal units?
What should be the future of hog production in Rice County?
What should be the role of local government in the regulation of animal production?^[45]

Twelve paid jurors, selected at random within Rice County, were asked to answer those questions after reflecting on the issue for a full week. On Monday, they listened to testimony from academic experts and administrators on hog production methods, demographics, zoning, and regulations. Jurors had the chance to ask questions of these witnesses, and the jurors also met with their moderator to make certain that they understood the six questions they would have to answer. Tuesday and Wednesday, jurors heard from farmers, community members, professors, and administrators, who discussed the economic, environmental, and social effects of hog farming, as well as local zoning and regulation. Thursday morning, jurors deliberated on the six questions, and in the afternoon, they reviewed and then presented their final recommendations.

In the end, the jurors reached agreement on every question put before them. They recognized a wide array of costs and beneflts associated with hog farming, and they believed it was essential to regulate feedlots, both large and small. In effect, the jury rejected the question, "How large is too large?" Instead, the jurors wrote, "It doesn't matter how many animal units you have; it's what you do with them and the manure." According to the jurors, hog farms of any size should be subject to random on-site inspections to ensure compliance with state guidelines, inspect manure management practices, and to check the health of the pigs. In answering their "charge," the jurors also made other speciflc recommendations about zoning, permits, and ownership.

Though representative, deliberative, and articulate, the citizen jury on hog farming shared the same problem as the citizen conferences: it

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is difficult to influence elected public officials when jury deliberations have no direct electoral implications. In the case of this jury, one Rice County commissioner who attended the jurors' press conference was dismissive of the recommendations: "The jurors don't have the responsibility for citizens of Rice County. I do…. Why should I make the decision to compromise the welfare of the majority for the beneflt of a few?" The other commissioner who attended the press conference promised to "sit down and read through the written document" jurors prepared and "take them into consideration" when making a decision on the issue.^[46] An editorial in the local paper praised the jury process as a "starting point for discussion" but opined that "the jury's recommendations will probably not make it through the political process intact— and perhaps it shouldn’.^[47]

Some citizen juries, however, have focused directly on elections and candidates. A 1976 presidential jury evaluated the issue stands of Jimmy Carter and President Gerald Ford. Teamed with the Minnesota League of Women Voters, the Jefferson Center also held juries on the 1989 St. Paul, Minnesota, mayoral race and the 1990 Minnesota gubernatorial primary and general elections. In 1992, the center also joined with the Pennsylvania League of Women Voters to convene citizen juries on the views of Republican Senator Arlen Specter and his Democratic opponent, Lynn Yeakel.^[48]

The Pennsylvania effort was the most ambitious and influential. Specter used its flndings in television campaign ads, and the Philadelphia Inquirer praised the process and presented its flndings in detail even though it endorsed Yeakel. On election day, Specter prevailed with 49 percent to 46 percent of the vote despite a vigorous Yeakel campaign, which spent over $5 million dollars and attacked Specter's actions during the conflrmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. It is impossible to determine the extent to which the jury results influenced the election, but the important point is that the Pennsylvania citizen jury demonstrated how a random sample forum can have direct electoral implications.^[49]