Public Participation

4.1 Improve and Report on Implementation of the U.S. Public Participation Playbook

In 2015 the Administration launched the U.S. Public Participation Playbook, Participation.USA.gov, developed by the GSA with contributions from six dozen federal managers, as a template providing best practices, resources, and performance metrics to encourage public participation in government decision-making. The GSA will work with the Administration and stakeholders to update and improve the U.S. Public Participation Playbook based on feedback from agencies, civil society, and the public, and begin publicly sharing how the playbook’s resources are implemented in order to improve public participation in government.

4.2 Conduct Feedback USA Pilots

Feedback USA is a pilot program to improve customer experience where citizens use the federal government the most. Customers applying at Department of State passport agencies/centers, SSA card centers, U.S. Citizen and Immigration Service Centers, VA benefit centers, and GSA’s Quantico base store will now get the chance to have their say. Customers will be able to provide quick feedback through a less-than-a-second tap of a button at a kiosk and can provide additional feedback through the agency’s website. Agency partners will see this anonymous feedback in real time, so they can act quickly to resolve any issues and improve their services to the public.

The initiative for Feedback USA is a part of an administration priority to improve customer service. The Customer Service Cross Agency Priority Goal, established in 2014 is led by the Office of Management and Budget and SSA. The pilot is scheduled to last for one year with quarterly phases to help evaluate usefulness.

4.3 Expand and Improve Public Participation in the Development of Regulations with eRegulations

Rulemaking covers public policy issues including energy, education, homeland security, agriculture, food safety, environmental protection, health care, tax administration, and transportation safety. Public participation in Federal rulemaking provides individuals a meaningful opportunity to comment on these policy issues. The open source eRegulations platform has been expanded and is being used by additional government agencies including the FEC and ATF. The GSA’s 18F team created a pilot project in 2016 for collecting public comment on proposed regulations to allow more granular commenting on proposals down to the paragraph level rather than just one text field for the entire regulation. The GSA will continue to expand and improve upon the eRegulations platform with continued user research and adding new agency users.

4.4 Share Best Practices and Strategy on Yelp for Government and Other “Voice of the Customer” Programs

Yelp, a Web and mobile-based user review platform, hosts insights from “real people giving their honest and personal opinions on everything from restaurants and spas to coffee shops.” With the addition of ‘Public Services and Government’ under the Yelp umbrella, agencies can continue to find new ways to use customer insights to improve citizen services. Since the GSA helped Yelp meet federal use standards, agencies are now able to use Yelp to potentially: - Claim existing pages or launch new pages to listen and respond to customer comments - Use customer feedback data to drive improvements in citizen services.

The GSA will continue to help agencies pilot Yelp, Artificial Intelligence for Customer Experience, and other “Voice of the Customer” services, sharing best practices and strategies for adapting these platforms for public service use.