Visioning committee re-focuses

By James Patrick Schmidt

Published April 24, 2007

Columbia residents are turning their backs on fate and working to make a difference in the future of the city.

The Columbia Visioning Committee met April 17, and the Citizen Topic Groups met April 18. The purpose of the meeting was to give the topic groups a chance to compare priorities.

"Now they're going to continue to meet to make sure that if the topic groups have some overlapping issues that they meet and address them so they're not duplicated efforts," Visioning Committee Co-chairwoman Dianne Drainer said. "It would be possible that some topics will overlap, so they're going to have some meetings about that."

Working to clarify the plan for what is needed most in Columbia is also a priority.

"I think the big goal is now, essentially, we're trying revise the plan we have so far," Visioning Committee Co-chairman Jeffrey Williams said.

The plan is to have the next large public presentation by the end of next month.

"Once they've really locked the goals and strategies down in the end of May, they're going to work on something called a Community Resource Scan," Drainer said. "Basically, looking at what are the resources we need to make this happen."

Another priority at this meeting will be giving the public an opportunity to share opinions about the recommendations of the Citizen Topic Groups.

"We want to give citizens an opportunity to say 'I like this' or 'I don't like this,'" Williams said.

Columbia residents also had a chance to give insight at the April 4 visioning meeting where the Exploring the Vision survey was administered.

According to the Exploring the Vision Summary Report, the survey "offered a mid-course check-in to confirm whether the work of the Citizen Topic Groups is headed in the right direction."

According to the report, 278 citizens participated in the survey.

The participants ranked the subjects brought up by the Citizen Topic Groups on a scale of one to five to identify which they thought were most important. One was ranked as "not important" and five was "very important," according to the report.

All of the topics scored well on the system.

"It is important to note that no goal received a score lower than 3.44 on a scale where three was 'important,'" the report states. "Generally, the participants felt that the goals are important to a greater or lesser degree. It is also interesting to note that the top 10 scoring goals come from eight different Citizen Topic Groups, emphasizing that there are a variety of issues that are important to the residents of Columbia and are reflected in the emerging vision."

The results of the Visioning Committee's findings eventually will be presented to the Columbia City Council, but there is no specific timetable.

"Part of what we're trying to do is to relax the timeline so that people have a chance to look at what we're doing and to be satisfied and comfortable with the process," Williams said. "At this point, what we're trying to do is to make sure all the stakeholders are comfortable with the process, and we're working to achieve that comfort level."

Drainer said participation has been excellent by the citizens of Columbia.

"I asked the consultants what type of participation they've had in other groups, and they say they're lucky in other cities to have a hundred people at meetings," she said. "And our meetings, have anywhere from 200 to 350 people, and I think it really shows a tremendous amount of participation by our community."