While the City of Yorkton's Community Strategic Plan Conference has been written about before in this space before, and how it is a positive step for Yorkton Council as a guiding document moving forward in the next decade, however, the Plan is important enough to be re-visited here this week.
Certainly the City has done a good job of creating a list of participants, or at least groups and interest areas, in that it represents a good cross section of the community.
However, the key to the success of the process will come from the 41 participants being able to forget which group they are part of once the doors close at the Conference and the work begins.
It will not accomplish what Council is hoping for if, as an example, the two people put forward by the Yorkton Chamber of Commerce push for a pro-business strategic plan in isolation of all other areas.
At an information meeting on the Conference Monday Mayor James Wilson said they hope people involved will take as broad an approach as possible in terms of creating a future vision of the city.
Wilson was right in suggesting most people in attendance will wear multiple hats they can draw upon. A business owner is likely aware of education issues as a parent, and has an interest in sports or culture groups for the same reasons. They may also be involved in a service club and have connections to others areas which are part of the process.
The second factor participants have to remember is that it is looking forward a decade. That of course is not an easy vision. Again as Wilson pointed out five years ago no one would have suggested two canola crushing plants would establish in the city, and their arrival immediately changed the landscape of the local economy, and in essence how the community may view its future moving forward.
In this era, a decade is a massive amount of time. Just think of how the world has changed in the last 10-years on the information front, with the development of the Internet, cell phones and associated technology. They are fundamentally changing the world, and Yorkton in the process too.
And finally, Council holds a huge responsibility once the community has developed the strategic plan. It must use the suggestions of the community moving forward. Not all suggestions will be viable, but there will be strategic ideas Council should feel obligated to weave into future plans and budgets to see the ideas go beyond the report page to reality.
Only then will the efforts made by citizens at the upcoming Conference be worth their time and effort.
