Overview

Full community participation, following the steps outlined for Building Communities for Tomorrow will result in both education and action, learning and doing.

The promise of action improvement, development, completed projects motivates people to get involved in the community. People don't want to just stay busy, but need to feel confident that their actions are moving them closer to some desired end. Building Communities for Tomorrow will help your community set an overall direction (vision) and specific goals for your future.

This work gets more difficult when community energy and resources are dormant or spread over too many, sometimes incompatible directions. A shared direction means that resources time, energy, finances, talents, and enthusiasm can flow in the same direction. Building Communities for Tomorrow will help you include more people in the discussion and decisions about your future. This expands the pool of individuals committed to your community's future.

Building consensus about community priorities is not easy. Building Communities for Tomorrow helps you base decisions on the best information available about your community and your issues. You will learn how to access, analyze, and apply data and information to local decisions.

Identifying and involving such a diverse mix of people may be a new way of doing business in your community and it usually requires new skills. People in your community have different perspectives about what ought to be done and how to do it. You need to learn to productively disagree and build agreement about common priorities. Building Communities for Tomorrow helps you learn leadership skills for working better together.

Community Outcomes:

• Realistic assessment of current situation in your community
• Clear shared direction for your community's future
• Concrete strategies for community development and change Projects implemented
• Individuals' leadership capacity and analytical skills improved
• Improved environment for decision making
• Measurable progress against locally-defined benchmarks

• All community interests will be involved. In your community there are a variety of perspectives, ideas, and sources of information. Each of these should be involved in the work and the decision-making so Building Communities for Tomorrow will be a truly community-wide program.

• Decisions are made by the community, based on data, information, and consensus. ISU Extension will help you access and analyze data and information about issues and options. We do not come with answers for your community. Building Communities for Tomorrow guides you through a process for devising your own answers and helping you make better decisions.

• All community sectors and issues are involved, not just a single issue. Building Communities for Tomorrow focuses on all sectors important to the community not just jobs, retail, education, or recreation.

• We're in it for the long haul -- not a quick fix. The first five steps may take from six months to one year. Some action on projects may begin during this year, but most of the time will be spent learning and planning.

• Community human and financial commitments are needed. A core group of approximately 45 people must commit to a year of work on the process. The community should set aside $3,000 to $5,000 in an account for use on project expenses (e.g., surveys, committee mailings, communication, training).

• Capacity building occurs before problem solving. More knowledge of the community, possible strategies, and their impacts is needed before decisions can be finalized and action taken. New actions might require first learning new skills.

Building Communities for Tomorrow

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Extension programs are available to all without regard to race, color, national origin, religion, sex, age, or disability. Questions or comments? Contact the Extension to Communities Secretary, lindaek@iastate.edu last updated Thursday March 01 2001