A letter to the provincial assembly and executive

[Eðo Grischun]

To the Provincial Assembly and Executive,

Recently, a suggestion was made at a meeting of the Council of Governors by its member for Fiova.  The original text of that suggestion is as follows:

I'm going to throw a completely wild suggestion in here which might not only help revive our various local governments, but also solve an issue which has plagued post-Reunision Talossa; how to get new immigrants involved in a way that kept them around.

Time was that a new citizen would be given Cosă seats right off the bat to "get them involved"; however, in practice this meant that the ruling parties just tended to "assimilate" new citizens, leading to self-perpetuating dominance of a single party.

But what if we expected all new citizens to get involved in their local Governments? And what if this Council decided that every Provincial leadership would go away and draw up a Getting New Citizens Involved In the Provinces plan over the next month or two?

(Miestrâ Schiva, UrN)

The Ministry of the Interior now seeks the opinions of the provincial assemblies and executives on this proposal.  I encourage each province to begin conversations on this topic by whichever means and manner suitable and practicable to your local region.

Additionally, the Ministry would like to inform the provincial assemblies and executives that the Ministry and its immigration bureau stands ready to work with each individual province in implementing any feasible ideas to meet the aims of the above quoted proposal.

If anybody wishes to speak directly with me on this matter then I can be reached via PM here on Witt or by email at immigration@talossa.com


Yours for Talossa,

The Right Honourable Senator Éovart Grischun S.H.
Minister of the Interior

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

As the Secretary of State of Fiova (and of course proponent of this idea), I would like to heartily recommend it to my provincial cüncitaxhiens.

I've often been a bit puzzled when people start wringing their hands about the lack of provincial activity in Talossa, considering that "situation normal" for provincial governments has always been inactivity. In pre-Internet Talossa, if the history books tell us correctly, provinces only became "active" when one or more people decided to use one as a "personal fantasy fiefdom" (Count van Metaira in Port Maxhestic) or to use it as a power base against the national government (KR1 in Vuode, the short lived "Bradford Province" etc).

So if we want provincial governments to be active, we need to give them a reason to be active. I know that some people - eg Lord Hooligan, as quoted in my signature - are not happy with that, and think the provinces are just there to look pretty and not be used. The way in which they stopped the Fiova-Florencia unification, and then proceeded to do absolutely nothing with Florencia - not even vote for its Senator - shows the deadening hand of what can happen when people don't want anything to happen.

To become active in Fiova would be extremely easy given our direct-democracy General Assembly. Perhaps Fiova's own requirements to be able to report to the Ministry of the Interior that a new citizen was participating would be simple - standing for election for Capitán, Tuischac'h or as a member of the Praisidéu, or even just proposing a bill and seeing it through to a vote in the GA.

What do others think?

[Bråneu Excelsio]

I think dividing our Cantons into Townships and doing something with them might be fun and a good way to get new citizens.

But what can we do with them?

Grant them and trading them as cards? Merging them? Fighting over who gets to name them?  Playing Risk with them?
Maybe make them count as points and fight to see who gets more points at the end of the year? Make a raffle to see who gets what? Make flags for the townships?

I mean, half of these things sounds like a riot.

[Mic’haglh Autófil, SMC EiP]

Make flags for the townships?

Not a Fiovan, but I knew I liked this guy  ;D