Community Visioning for Kingston

[Frontenac]

Our tangled development process for a multiplex and a LVEC seems to have side tracked our thinking from considering a broader vision and community planning for Kingston.

In Portland, Orgeon they have taken a far more inclusive approach to developing a community vision...


PortlandVision Project Update

February 21, 2006

The Vision Committee – 57 members strong – met on February 11 for their first Retreat. It's an honor to work with this diverse group of Portlanders – they are indeed working, and with great passion and thought. This Vision Project will be framed well by their direction.

The highlights to the Retreat are many, but let's just say dancing and drawing were involved! In addition to the fun, the members heard back from the 6 subcommittees (described below). The Retreat helped the whole committee understand how much work has been going on in the smaller groups, and there were many opportunities for everyone to contribute to the project.

Here’s what the subcommittees are currently working on:

Communication--project name and logo (The name was voted on at the Retreat, so a decision is imminent. The Committee drew their ideas for logos at the Retreat. One volunteer will generate the logo based on the creative input received.)

Engagement--creating the overall plan for reaching out to 100,000 Portlanders. (That's a big number, so we need creative ideas and they are generating them!)

Analysis--drafting the core set of vision questions and creating a process to receive and review the information generated.

Grants—We received 143 grant applications! This group is reviewing applications and will support the grantees selected.

Speakers Bureau--100,000 conversations is a lot of talking! This is the group that is organizing and training volunteers to take the show on the road.

Research--The first part of the project is talking to Portlanders about the big questions. In the fall, with the help of the Progress Board and community volunteers, updated Community Trends will help guide a more in-depth conversation with Portlanders. They'll be interviewing experts and providing a snapshot of our community.

Each group has staff support and a community leader. The Community Vision site on portlandonline has updates with meeting minutes/agendas/upcoming meetings, etc. Check it out!

Portland Community Vision web portal: http://www.portlandonline.com/mayor/index.cfm?c=39149

Resources:

Processes that have been carried out in other places can provide important tools and ideas for Portland's process. To learn more about how visioning has been done in other places, visit some of the links below:

Hillsboro 2020
http://www.hillsboro2020.org/

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imagineCALGARY
http://www.imaginecalgary.ca/

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Imagine Chicago
http://www.imaginechicago.org/

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Envision Central Texas
http://www.envisioncentraltexas.org/

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Vincent Vision
http://www.vincentvision2024.com.au

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Maroochy 2025: A Visioning Journey
http://www.maroochy2025.net/

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Bend 2030
http://www.bend2030.org/

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Inclusive City - The Washington, D.C. Comprehensive Plan
http://www.inclusivecity.org

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Planning for the Future (http://www.portlandonline.com/mayor/index.cfm?&a=107045) (PDF Document, 353kb)
A handbook on community visioning published by the Center for Rural Pennsylvania.


Some of the above links are to PDF documents.

[Dogma]

Beyond Hesheys 500 recent jobs loss....

Bosal Canada Inc. said the company had to lay off the workers because of a downturn in North America’s auto sector and they would be moving some of the work done at the Kingston plant to Mexico.

Two weeks before that, 123 employees lost their jobs when Michigan-based Collins and Aikman announced it was closing its Gananoque plastic-moulding factory, which supplies parts to the auto sector.

In December 2005, 100 people lost their jobs when Mahle closed its engine-parts plant in Gananoque.

Wong said there is a disturbing trend across Ontario with manufacturing jobs leaving the area.

He said Smiths Falls may even have an economic advantage over Kingston because of the large scale of the chocolate factory closure relative to the town’s population base.

“It will tend to make Smiths Falls possibly a higher-target area for provincial government funding,” said Wong. “Governments allocate money on a regional basis, so if we’re lumped in with Smiths Falls, anything that goes there won’t come here.”

In addition, Wong said the closure of the chocolate factory highlights the need for Kingston to distinguish itself from other neighbouring municipalities so that companies will want to locate here.

“This comes back to the notion of why it’s so important that we need to move quickly on things like the Grand Theatre, the multiplex, the Large Venue Entertainment Centre and Market Square, because at the end of the day, those are the things that will stand us apart from those other areas,” he said.

It’s not enough for a municipality to market itself as a small town that’s a “nice place to live.”

“That’s not enough as far as companies go,” said Wong.

Jeff Garrah, interim president of Kingston’s economic development agency, said hundreds of people are losing their jobs in eastern Ontario and governments should do more to sustain economic development locally.

“If you look at eastern Ontario, there’s a disturbing trend that we’re probably in some regards not far off some of the challenges that northern Ontario has had to face,” he said.

Garrah said the federal government in particular may need to start looking at establishing a program designed to promote economic development in all communities in eastern Ontario.

He cited the Eastern Ontario Development Program that already exists, but said municipalities larger than 100,000 aren’t eligible for funding. Kingston is one of those municipalities.

“We’re not far over 100,000 – why exclude us?”

Noting Bombardier, Alcan and Norcom have all downsized or shutdown operations...these are 1000's of well paying jobs not being replaced!

Since the late 1990's (7500 jobs) have left this community!
= 7500 x 50,000 a year salary = $ 375,500,000 million dollars GONE!

And our local council worries about 4 million in obvious construction "needs" for the LVEC! ??????????????????????

If our council spends any more time and effort minimanaging these projects - for the sake of a few "concerned"
citizens taxes....

The public needs to wake up and "concern" themselves of an entire generation of working citizens that pay into your pensions, local taxes and economic quality of life. They should be more about saving our industry not discouraging innovative projects.

[Lydia]

The highlights to the Retreat are many, but let's just say dancing and drawing were involved! In addition to the fun, the members heard back from the 6 subcommittees (described below). The Retreat helped the whole committee understand how much work has been going on in the smaller groups, and there were many opportunities for everyone to contribute to the project.

Frontenac, thanks for sharing your posting with the rest of us. Wouldn't it be great is ALL DISTRICTS set up something like this and Kingstonians had this type of pride in working towards a better friendly, more informed city.