Committee prepares to take Vision Dixie to cities
thespectrum.com
Article published Jan 26, 2008
KATIE OLIVERI
koliveri@thespectrum.com ST. GEORGE - Vision Dixie's five-person implementation committee is gearing up to take it to the cities. The committee met for the second time Thursday morning, reviewing the next steps for encouraging implementation of Vision Dixie to the various communities in Washington County. At Thursday's committee meeting, Washington County Commissioner Denny Drake, who's chairing the implementation committee, assigned each member to three communities. First, committee members will make initial contact with their assigned cities immediately and present them with the Vision Dixie final report booklet, which outlines the 10 Vision Dixie principles. The idea is to give the communities time to review the principles and information in the report. Also at that time, committee members will ask city or town officials to decide on a meeting, possibly a work session, where implementation committee members can go back and make a presentation. At those work meetings, committee members plan to show a PowerPoint presentation that will highlight the principles and be used as a discussion tool, the Vision Dixie final report and present cities with two checklists, which offer suggestions on how to implement the Vision Dixie principles. In addition to Drake, the implementation committee includes Karl Wilson, mayor of LaVerkin, Rick Rosenberg, mayor of Santa Clara, Ken Sizemore, executive director of Five County Association of Governments, and Kayla Koeber, a resident of Leeds who served on the Vision Dixie steering committee. St. George resident Richard Meyers said he hopes the implementation committee makes an impact on cities to follow Vision Dixie. He attended part of the meeting Thursday because he wanted to see how Vision Dixie was moving forward. "Vision Dixie is a good concept," Meyers said. "I'd like to see it implemented more. I'd like to see more strength in the implementation." Meyers said he wants to see increased focus on protecting the hillsides in the county from development. The final report for Vision Dixie was recently presented to residents during a bonus session at this year's Washington County Economic Summit. The Vision Dixie principles, which were compiled based on feedback from residents during the public input process and outlined in the Vision Dixie final report, include plan regionally, implement locally; maintain air and water quality and conserve water; guard signature scenic landscapes; provide rich, connected natural recreation and open space; direct growth inward, focusing growth on walkable, mixed-use centers, and build balanced transportation. Then, at the work meetings with the various individual cities, implementation committee members plan to encourage various communities to make contact with them on how they want to proceed and if they'd like to set up another meeting, for example, a town meeting, for committee members to actually discuss and review the suggested strategies on the implementation checklists. Envision Utah consultants put the checklists together. Committee members went through the suggested comprehensive planning checklist on Thursday, principle by principle, to ensure they were on the same page as far as explaining the various strategies suggested to implement specific principles. For example, when discussing the idea of communities following general plans closely and adopting consistency policies as part of the Vision Dixie principle to plan regionally and implement locally, the committee stressed the importance of cities and towns following general plans once adopted and making zoning consistent with the general plan. And when it's not, cities need to address the issue. Koeber said the efforts of the committee focus on introducing the vision to the various communities, getting feedback and helping in the implementation. "It's to communicate effectively the vision and to see how we can assist in the implementation," she said, stressing the importance of keeping the public involved in the process. In the longer term, Koeber said, the committee hopes to serve as an implementation resource and continue to encourage communication among the cities in the county. Drake emphasized the reason for taking those various steps with the cities and having communities offer feedback on how they want to proceed after the implementation committee's initial efforts is because "it's the cities that will have to implement it (Vision Dixie)." As part of the committee's implementation efforts, members also plan to meet with public land agencies, developers and business leaders, for example, in a similar way to how they will meet with the various communities.
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