Fort Smith steering committee to focus on ‘momentum’

When members of the comprehensive plan steering committee meet on June 20, both the committee and members of the public will begin to have a clearer picture of what to expect as the process moves forward during the next 18 months.

According to Brian Traylor, a planner and urban designer with Wallace Roberts & Todd (WRT), the consulting group developing an update to the comprehensive plan, the meeting will "establish momentum for the group moving forward."

"The first meeting was introductions to the process and establishing expectations," he said.

Next Thursday's meeting will include two parts. The first part will include selecting chairpersons for the various committees within the overall steering committee, along with setting meeting times and determining "how they will logistically meet moving forward," he said.

The other component of next week's meeting will be to include some training for how to engage with the public as the work of the committee begins to actively engage with the public.

"What we are working toward with this steering committee meeting is getting vision from (the steering committee prior to) the community visioning series," he said.

According to Maggie Rice, a senior planner with the city of Fort Smith, the community visioning series will be a series of three meetings that will allow the community to express their vision for what the future of Fort Smith will be.

While the exact locations and times have not been determined, she said three meetings will be spread between July 29 and July 30 so as many members of the community as possible can take part in the process.

What will the steering committee and consultants from WRT be looking for from these public feedback sessions?

"As part of that public visioning series, committee members will facilitate roundtable discussions – strengths and weaknesses in the city and moving forward with what their vision is for the city. They'll be looking for what that vision is and what the threats are," Traylor said.

While the sessions will be open to the public and open for dialogue, members of the steering committee will guide the sessions, he said, which is why the group will receive about 45 minutes worth of training on how to facilitate public discussions.

"We'll get some help from the (steering) committee in formulating questions to be asked. We'll hopefully be honing exact questions to be asked and also letting them know how to engage the community. Some people may not have experience in that setting."

Part of the training will also include a mock session, Traylor explained.

"We want to be inclusive of all questions but also keep one person from grandstanding," he said.

Steering committee members will also be trained in how to lead those discussions while not interjecting their own opinions, Traylor said, since "the goal is to listen to all people's opinions and make sure they're recorded."

While much of the discussion up to this point has focused on where committee members see the city of Fort Smith in the future, Rice said the updated plan will not disregard the original 2002 plan. Instead, she said, it is simply an update.

"I think through the process, through the visioning sessions, we'll find out what portions of the 2002 (comprehensive) plan will be kept."

She said the city's Board of Directors received a status update in October 2011 on the success of the 2002 plan.

"Each of those tasks (updated for the board in October) was a task recommended from the plan in 2002," she said. "Obviously, if items are completed, they won't be carried over to this (updated comprehensive plan)."

Traylor said his staff has worked with the city to receive detailed information on how the previous plan was implemented and how to incorporate certain unfinished objectives into the updated plan.

"One of the things the city has done has done is provide an abbreviated memo of what's been accomplished, what has changed since the last plan, what steps they've made in completing some of the goals and we've done a lot of analysis of the existing conditions report. We're working with the city on that so that we have all of the information from the previous plan and focusing on the things that are most important to the community and what has changed. It's using all of the information that we have in the previous plan."

Deputy City Administrator Jeff Dingman said he is looking forward to next week and the process as it moves forward, incorporating both new and fresh ideas along with previous suggestions from the 2002 plan.

"I know a lot of these folks are just anxious to start."