The Gateway To Trust Is Framed By Credibility

Establishing credibility—not “winning trust”—should be the standard developers pursue when engaging communities. Establishing credibility with a community is within a developer’s control, but a community’s trust is a gift that it may never offer.

Key Takeaways

A community’s trust may be sought by land developers and others but is granted (or withheld) solely at the discretion of community leaders and members. In the end, communities are not merely evaluating development projects, they are also evaluating the people and institutions asking them to live with whatever negatives (challenges or impairments) that may come with projects. Because of this, trust may never be fully granted by a community, and developers should not enter engagement efforts expecting it as an entitlement or inevitable outcome. Engagement should instead be approached as an opportunity to enter a negotiation with community members where the understandings (not merely information) of likely impacts (positive and negative) can be communicated and solutions crafted.

Nevertheless, credibility IS achievable. Developers can demonstrate concern, competence, and consistency in ways that communities can observe and evaluate directly. Even when trust remains limited, establishing credibility can still reduce conflict, improve decision-making, strengthen long-term relationships, and increase the likelihood that projects succeed.

What It Means to Be Credible

(Concern + Competence + Consistency = Credibility)

In my experience, communities tend to evaluate credibility through three observable behaviors: concern, competence, and consistency.

Concern

Communities are generally capable of distinguishing between performative, transactional gestures and authentic concern. A credible developer demonstrates sincere concern for the well-being of the community and its residents. This requires more than expressing empathy at public meetings. It requires understanding community conditions, engaging community members early enough in the process to matter, respecting local knowledge, supporting community aspirations, and actively seeking to avoid harm.

For example, a developer proposing a battery storage facility near a residential neighborhood might fund independent air-quality or fire-risk assessments selected by the community itself rather than relying exclusively on company consultants. A mining company might invest in workforce training programs years before construction begins to demonstrate a long-term commitment to local economic development rather than short-term transactional interests.

Competence

Communities often judge competence less by promises than by demonstrated, acceptable results--meaning they evaluate whether commitments are actually fulfilled. If a developer promises noise mitigation, traffic controls, local hiring targets, or environmental protections, credibility depends on whether those commitments are delivered consistently and transparently.

For example, a developer that has failed several safety inspections and audits and has received violations and commensurate fines for uncontrolled and excessive air emissions will not be credible when it assures communities that its operations will pose no hazard. Similarly, a developer that commits to regular environmental monitoring but fails to publish results in an accessible and timely manner will undermine confidence in its competence.

Consistency

Consistency is credible behavior over time. Communities pay close attention to whether concern and competence persist when circumstances become difficult. They notice when engagement disappears after permits are issued or construction begins. By contrast, developers that maintain community advisory committees, publish regular operational reports, respond transparently to complaints, and continue local investments after construction and during its long-term operational phase are more likely to retain credibility—even during disputes or operational problems.

Consistency also requires developers to behave similarly across circumstances. A developer that promotes transparency when projects proceed smoothly but becomes defensive when problems arise will likely quickly lose credibility.  It will almost certainly diminish if the developer's position on community protections changes with political and policy regime shifts that allow for lower or less protective standards, permissive rezoning, or other undesired land use decisions.

Of Trust and Credibility: An Important Distinction

Consider the following scenario: A developer enters a community only after transportation routes and rights-of-way have been selected, permits drafted, and contracts negotiated. Public meetings are scheduled, consultants are hired, and residents are invited to “provide input.” But often the most important decisions have already been made, to include footprint, technology, budgets, and schedules. In my experience, in these cases community engagement is often tactical, transactional and is less about consultation and more about persuasion. Communities recognize this. In many cases, they understand that the engagement process is intended less to shape the project than to manage opposition to it. In such a process a community’s trust is not deemed necessary and so it is not sought.

Conversely, a developer who approaches community engagement as a form of long-term risk management strategy—and who consults communities early and sincerely—is more likely to be viewed favorably by community leaders and residents. The developer is likely to be seen as “credible”.  However, credibility and trust are not the same thing. A community may eventually choose to trust a developer, but only after the developer has demonstrated credibility over time. Even then, trust may never be fully granted, and missteps may quickly diminish a community’s good will and along with it a community’s tolerance. As a result, effective meaningful community engagement should be iterative, not transactional.

The Purpose of Community Engagement

Requirements for “meaningful community engagement” have spread steadily across the United States. States from California to Connecticut now require some form of public engagement as a condition of permitting major projects. These requirements emerged largely because communities—particularly politically and economically disadvantaged communities—became increasingly effective at challenging decisions made without their participation.

Project developers and their supporters seek to explain the “benefits” of the project, reassure residents, and identify adversaries. Its objective is to sufficiently reduce opposition by means of appeasement to secure permits and avoid delays. However, “meaningful” engagement requires communities to have a genuine opportunity to influence decisions that may affect their health, environment, economic well-being, or quality of life. 

Some developers take a different approach, particularly those who consider long-term operational costs. Many power and energy developers, for example, now begin outreach before submitting permit applications by meeting with neighborhood associations, churches, school officials, and local business owners to identify concerns about traffic, emissions, odors, noise, visual impacts, or property values. In some cases, these early discussions have led developers to alter truck routes, relocate facilities farther from homes, or establish local workforce agreements. While early engagement does not guarantee support, it often improves credibility because communities can see that their concerns influenced project decisions.

The Limits of Transactional Engagement

Transactional engagement is often rooted in a narrow, time-limited form of risk analysis. Communities are assessed primarily in terms of whether they can delay, litigate, organize against, or politically damage a project. Engagement strategies are then designed to minimize resistance and protect short-term budgets and schedules.

As a result, observed outcomes suggest projects frequently follow the path of least political resistance. Communities perceived as economically or politically weak may be viewed as the most “cost-effective” locations when all other factors are similar. This approach increasingly fails.

In the last several decades, communities historically excluded from land-use decisions have become far more sophisticated in representing their interests. Grassroots organizations now routinely engage lawyers, environmental scientists, public health experts, media organizations, and political coalitions to challenge projects they believe threaten their interests.

Recent history demonstrates the risks of transactional engagement. In Louisiana’s “Cancer Alley,” generations of petrochemical development in predominantly Black communities generated profound distrust because many residents believed decisions were made without meaningful consultation and with little regard for cumulative health impacts. Similarly, although not a land-use dispute, the Flint water crisis illustrates how quickly institutions lose credibility when residents conclude their concerns are dismissed or minimized by technical experts and public officials.

Large infrastructure disputes also demonstrate how communities once viewed as peripheral stakeholders can become highly effective participants in permitting battles. Opposition to the Keystone XL Pipeline, the Atlantic Coast Pipeline, and the Dakota Access Pipeline showed that organized communities can influence permitting outcomes, attract national attention, delay construction, increase costs, and in some cases stop projects entirely.

As a result, developers who treat engagement primarily as a public relations or compliance strategy often discover too late that communities are evaluating something much more fundamental: Not whether they can trust them, but whether they are credible.