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| Visioning project discussion. From l to r: Ken Bowman, city council member; Joe Ewald, director of finance; David Cameron, city council member and Frank Twehues of CT Consultants. |
By Robin Gee
The Fort Thomas Community Plan is
moving forward this month with the creation of six working committees, each to
be charged with developing plans for different aspects of the project.
Frank Twehues of CT Consultants met with city officials, staff and council
members at a brief meeting before the August general city council meeting to
discuss committee formation, assign council members to each of the committees
and brainstorm ideas for community liaisons.
Leadership teams
Committee leadership teams will be
comprised of a city council member, a city staff member, a technical advisor
(consultant) and a liaison from the community.
Plans are to have committee
leadership in place in the next week or two and begin to spread the word. A
community meeting is tentatively planned for Monday, September 25, to introduce
the committees to the public and invite interested community members to join.
City Administrator Ron Dill
has been working with project consultants at CT Consultants and Human Nature to
identify city staff members to serve as resources for each committee. The
consultants also have selected members from within their organizations to serve
as technical advisors.
The Committees
•
Land Use and Zoning will identify and work with zoning issues, form-based code and
economic development.
•
Transportation and Connectivity will identify modes of connectivity across the community and
handle transportation issues.
•
Parks and Open Space will identify recreation and green space needs.
•
Utilities and City-owned
Facilities will cover non-park city facilities
and infrastructure systems such as water, electric, gas, telecommunications,
networks and other technologies.
•
Regional Partnerships and
Collaboration will work with adjacent communities
to identify regional needs and how Fort Thomas plans can fit into the larger
picture.
•
Funding and Implementation will identify funding resources, available revenue and
possibilities for potential revenue streams.
In addition to expertise by the lead
consultants, two specialized firms have been asked to help with technical
aspects of the project. AECOM is a design and engineering firm with expertise
working with transportation systems. Glaserworks provides architecture and
urban design expertise.
Council members step up
Assigning council members to each of
the committees took very little time. Most were interested in more than one
area.
Mayor Eric Haas encouraged
council members to attend any and all committee meetings that are of interest
to them, explaining that the selection of one council member per committee
would provide a point person to aid efficiency and ease of communication.
City council member committee
assignments are:
•
Land Use and Zoning: John Slawter
•
Transportation and Connectivity: Ken
Bowman
•
Parks and Open Space: Jeff Bezold
•
Utilities and City-owned Facilities: David
Cameron
•
Regional Partnerships and
Collaboration: Lisa Kelly
•
Funding and Implementation: Roger
Peterman
A call to the community
After council members were assigned,
the group brainstormed ideas for possible community liaisons for each
committee. Over the next week or two, council members, consultants and city
officials will approach community members to find out if they might be interested
in serving as a liaison.
Community members who are interested
or who have ideas should contact City Administrator Ron Dill at rdill@ftthomas.org.
The next step is to recruit members
of the community who are interested in or have expertise in any of the
committee areas.
Haas said at this time he did not
want to limit the number of people on a committee. "I think we’ll see a good response," he said. "And I want attract a lot of people to this.
That is why I wanted to wait until after the Sesquicentennial celebration
because many of our most active citizens were involved with that, and I know
many of them will be very interested in this."
Next steps
According to Twehues, the visioning
project can be roughly broken into three phases. In addition to committee
formation, the Awareness Phase includes research, data gathering and analysis,
a review of statutory requirements to be considered a Comprehensive Plan by the
state and generally laying the groundwork.
A survey will be issued during this
phase to gather public input and ideas. This phase is expected to go through
the end of the year.
The Exploration Phase, said Twehues,
is the most fun and exciting phase. "This is where you test your
boundaries, see what’s available. You can go as big or small as you want, play
with the options. You have a great community here and there are possibilities
up the river and into the town. Then you start paring it down."
The next phase will take what the
committees have pulled together and develop a plan and the strategies necessary
to put the plan into action and turn the vision into reality.
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