Park City’s last community visioning project was done in 2009. Now almost 10 years later, the city is preparing a request for proposals for someone to oversee the 2020 visioning to help set the community’s priorities for the next decade and beyond. Melissa Allison has more:
In 2009, the visioning project resulted in a goal of Keeping Park City, Park City. Other important values were identified including: protect the town’s historic character and small-town feel, keep a sense of community and the area’s natural setting.
Park City Budget Operations Manager Jed Briggs said city officials want to know if those values have changed.
“My guess is that those values that we had from before are going to be very similar to what we’re looking at," Briggs said. "But, that there might be some nuances and some changes and any kind of community input would be helpful as we you know, really try to incorporate the community’s desires and wishes into our strategic plan in process.”
Community Engagement Manager Linda Jager said the entire process will take about 16 months.
“We’re hoping to start the planning process in October," Jager said. "And then we will start the community dialogue activities and events in February and that will continue through the summer. And then we’ll get back together and analyze the results and put a report together and bring that back to council and the community.”
Times have changed a lot since the first time the city created a collective vision in 1989.
Jager is confident the city will continue to evolve and some of the goals might change – but there are those values she expects will stay the same.
“What we heard last time with the goal of keeping Park City, Park City," Jager said. "I anticipate we’ll hear that again, but how can we adjust and be able to keep Park City, Park City – keep our character?”
She said they want to hear what the community likes, what isn’t working and what they’d like to see happen.
“And together, kind of the second half of that visioning project is coming up with a vision statement for Park City," Jager said. "And that is something we can refer to as we do our strategic planning, making different decisions, setting goals and so forth.”
While the city only does the visioning every 10 years, city leaders hold strategic planning meetings annually. Because leadership changes, the way things are done could also. But, Briggs said it’s the outcome of the visioning process which keeps the focus regardless of who is sitting on council.
For instance – back in the 1980’s – the community focused on being a top resort town. Park City is on the world’s map as one of the best resort towns and Briggs says he thinks council is looking for more balance.
“The current council is really looking at, kind of having more of a balance community with our mission statement of having complete community," Briggs said. "And looking at those areas where we might be out of balance. And some of that might be because of that, you know the resort town that we’re living in and trying to kind of look at some of those areas where, maybe people are getting pushed out because they can’t afford to live here or just some of those other issues that we see.”
The city will be issuing an RFP as soon as a final draft is approved. They will accept applications from anyone, even those Park City. The total budgeted for the project is about $60,000. While the city will start working on this in October, Jager said the community won’t see any real activity and engagement until February.
I’m Melissa Allison, KPCW News.