The impetus for this gathering was the direction of the City Council that the HVP engage the Planning Commission and for the PC to provide its comments back to the Council. The hoped for outcome of this convening was that the PC members would have sufficient information about the Project to be able to offer comment, and ideally to support continued dialogue about the Project's merits and possible collaboration going forward.
The HVP Team had prepared a brief presentation designed to augment the information already provided to the PC members contained in the Project Manual. In due course, there was a shift to questions and answers among all those present. Questions raised and comments offered by the Commissioners included:
- How does this process connect to the City and its work?
- Who would the stakeholders be? How would you go about identifying them and deciding who should be included?
- Who would be the design professionals involved?
- It's the Planning Commission's job to develop a process, and we will welcome your input when the time is right
- Unsure how the Study Area output would have relevance for other areas of town
- Need to be cautious about how specific the planning is, we don't want to dictate what someone can do with their property
- The General Plan already states what the future of the town is intended to be, this should build on that
- The project is a bit schizophrenic -- it talks about the whole town on the one hand, but focuses in on one area as well.
- How can we indicate a direction for this study area that produces more of the older areas of town without being draconian?
- Like to see a seamless blend of active citizenry with our Planning Department
- What about the property owners, how will they be included?
- Need to see more specifics, how would you work with the City?
- I'd like to move beyond seeing this (planning effort) as a one time event and change the process within the planning process
- How does the GMO relate to this process?
- I'd rather see our planning be a home grown effort and avoid having people come in from outside
After 90 minutes of discussion, the group attempted to summarize areas of agreement and the Planning Director is charged with preparing a summary to be forwarded to the City Council.
The HVP Team is hugely grateful to the Planning Commissioners for devoting time, and thoughtful consideration, to the Project proposal. Our hope is that we will be able to continue this conversation and ultimately arrive at a process that supports the City's tasks at hand and increases the satisfaction level and quality of outcomes for all concerned.