The Resilience Institute began an exciting next step for the ongoing West Central Mountains Resilience Assessment. In October, we held two in-person workshops to bring together local stakeholders for a strategic planning session on Managed Growth, Natural Stewardship, and Shared Prosperity. The topic for this workshop quickly emerged as highly important from survey, focus group, and interview data from community members and decision makers. In particular, there was widespread concern about how rapid development in the region would impact groundwater and surface water in the region. To address this sometimes contentious topic, the Resilience Institute partnered with facilitator Monia Revoczi to help participants develop a shared vision for the future of the West Central Mountains, craft SMART goals for this vision, and outline specific strategies for each goal.
During the first workshop, agencies like the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality, the Idaho Department of Water Resources, and the Bureau of Reclamation presented on their existing water management and water monitoring projects in the West Central Mountain Regions. This was an important first step for level-setting, as it updated all 35 participants with a variety of professional backgrounds on what is currently being done to protect water resources. Fast forward to the end of the second workshop—by collaborating towards a shared vision, each goal team established and presented their 3-year strategic plan for the region.
The next steps are to develop action items within each strategy to nail down details like funding sources, stakeholder involvement, and community outreach.
In a local news story about this process, West Central Mountains Economic Development Council director Lindsey Harris said
“This felt to me today like the first time post-COVID that there is momentum and some synergy across the region to move things forward.”