Reprinted from Dunkirk Observer 2/7/10
Chautauqua County can be more than just the sum of its parts. Before those interested can help the region reach its potential, however, the county’s assets need to be inventoried. In 2007, the Chautauqua County Planning Board requested that a Comprehensive Plan Task Force be created to come up with a clear vision for the county. With a structure for the process in place and a timeline established, officials are ready to hear from residents about what they believe the county has to offer. The time is now. Two public meetings will be held this week, both at 6:30 p.m. The meetings are informational sessions, meant to educate about the planning process and the results of a recently completed county-wide phone survey. They will also serve as a forum for anyone with ideas about the county to be heard. “It is crucial that this resource-based approach to decision-making be guided by the opinions and ideas of the Chautauqua County residents,” said Mark Geise, deputy director of the county’s Department of Planning and Economic Development. “The information obtained from these meetings will be the initial stage in the planning process and will supplement the input that is being garnered through other means.” According to Geise, the public meetings will not exceed two hours in length and they will feature a presentation by Wallace, Roberts and Todd, an award-winning planning firm from Philadelphia. The meetings will also consist of breakout group discussions and a question-and-answer session. The first meeting will be held Wednesday at the Clarion Hotel in Dunkirk. The second meeting is scheduled for Thursday in the Hamilton Collegiate Center at Jamestown Community College. COUNTY ASSETS Chautauqua County could be any number of things. What makes the most sense, though, is for the county to focus on the things it does well — the things which have kept people here throughout the years and drawn others in as tourists. “You look at some place like a Las Vegas,” Geise said. “There was nothing there. Or you look at places where they might not have a lake or they really don’t have anything going for them, but they built their entire town around one particular thing. Well, we’ve got a bunch of those things.” There is no one type of tourism, according to Bill Daly, Chautauqua County Industrial Development Agency director. From the county’s trails and waterways to its educational attractions, agribusiness and entertainment offerings, Daly described our corner of Western New York as having a unique richness. “It’s just a matter of us all marching in the same direction,” Geise said of harnessing the county’s assets. “I used this analogy the other day, but if you’re a good passing football team — pass the ball. Don’t try to be something you’re not.” In preparing the comprehensive plan, Geise said officials are considering four questions about the county — Who are we right now? Who do we want to be? How do we get there? And what are the challenges of getting there? “That’s really all that we’re looking at,” Geise said. “We want to know what our assets are, what our growth areas are and then explore what we need to do to further develop those growth areas and address the deficiencies.” Already, officials have identified a total of 17 different issues of importance to the county — civic organizations, workforce development, local government, community action and religious institutions, architecture and historic preservation, the environment, small businesses and economic development, water resources, tourism and cultural resources, housing, agriculture and foods, active living and parks, the youth, health care, and infrastructure. “For each one of those, we had experts on that particular issue in the county pull a really diverse committee together,” On Thursday and Friday, we’re having focus group interviews with each one of those 17 groups to get that input from them to go along with the public input.” According to Geise, the public forums this week are just the first in a series of several such meetings. After this week’s scoping sessions, Geise said he and other officials will return to the public for them to review the information which was collected. “We’re going to come back and say, ‘Is this what you said? Do you agree with this?’” Geise explained. “We’ll show them how we prioritized the information coming out of those meetings and ask them if that’s what they were thinking. And it won’t only be the information coming from out of those meetings, but the phone surveys as well. The people will have an opportunity to look at the demographic data we’re doing about population trends and economic trends and other data. We’ll be merging those things together and spitting it back out for review.” THE PLANNING PROCESS According to officials, the comprehensive plan will be completed by this summer. Once completed, the new plan will be submitted to the public and the County Legislature for review. Once reviewed and adopted as the county’s official long-range planning policy, implementation will begin. According to Geise, the comprehensive plan will be a living document. To ensure it does not become stagnant, Geise spoke about having the County Planning Board review it and update it annually, adding new goals and checking off goals which have been accomplished. Officials describe the plan as something which will give the county clear vision in going forward. According to Don McCord, of the county’s Planning and Economic Development department, the last completed planning process that evaluated where Chautauqua County was, and where it needed to go, was the “Chautauqua County 1995 — A General Plan,” which was completed by the Chautauqua County Planning Department and Planning Board under the direction of John Luensman in 1978. Now a decade-and-a-half removed from that plan’s end date, the county is long overdue to have its “eyes checked,” as McCord put it in a recent article published in The Post-Journal. In sticking with that theme, officials have given the comprehensive plan the name “Chautauqua 20/20” — playing on the double meaning of perfect eyesight and the development that can be done in the next decade. Any comments or questions regarding the upcoming public meetings or any other aspects of the comprehensive plan should be addressed to Geise by calling 661-8904 or e-mailing geisem @co.chautauqua.ny.us.
“We’re trying to find out what this county can be.'
Chautauqua County Industrial Development Agency Director William Daly
By NICHOLAS L. DEAN OBSERVER
