Dialogue Matters: WIPPS Marks Culmination of Let’s Talk, Marathon County
Dialogue Matters: WIPPS Marks Culmination of Let’s Talk, Marathon County
On Tuesday, September 24, WIPPS held a gathering to celebrate the culmination of Let’s Talk, Marathon County, a program that brings together residents from across the political spectrum to have moderated discussions on difficult issues. In attendance at the event were program participants, staff, community leaders, and representatives from various organizations in Marathon County.
The event provided an opportunity to unite around a simple but critical idea: dialogue matters.
The idea for Let’s Talk began in 2022 when WIPPS surveyed Lincoln and Marathon County residents to ask how they felt about issues related to community welcomeness. The survey found that residents were most uncomfortable interacting with people from different political backgrounds. In light of this finding, WIPPS applied for a grant from the New Pluralists organization aimed at addressing and overcoming community division through citizen participation. The Let’s Talk, Marathon County program was one of only 32 locally led projects awarded a grant out of nearly 800 applicants across the United States.
Since its inception in 2023, Let’s Talk has held 50 deliberative dialogues — 42 in English and eight in Spanish — on six unique topics, including youth mental health, homelessness, elections, immigration, childcare, and gun violence. For each dialogue, WIPPS staff took notes and surveyed participants to identify key themes and insights, the results of which have been released to the public.
The WIPPS research team found that, across all of the Let’s Talk topics, more than 80% of participants reported that participating in the dialogues made them more confident in the community’s ability to have civil conversations about complex issues. And at least 70% of participants reported that there was quite a bit or a great deal of common ground.
“These findings are striking when you consider that the Let’s Talk panelists represent the full spectrum of political affiliations, including conservatives, moderates, and liberals,” explained Sharon Belton, WIPPS senior public policy fellow and research partner. “Despite their political differences, large majorities identified areas of considerable common ground. And these findings were consistent, even when discussing polarizing issues like managing immigration or approaches to preventing gun deaths.”
With the conclusion of the grant, WIPPS now seeks to address the question: how can deliberative dialogue continue to help our communities in Marathon County to bridge divides and tackle tough issues in a constructive way?
To join the conversation and learn more about Let’s Talk, Marathon County, or to explore how deliberative dialogue works, visit wipps.org/letstalk or reach out to us at info@wipps.org.
