The Imagine Greater Tucson survey needs the voice of the region’s business community to help choose how our region grows.

The survey — available online at www.imaginegreatertucson.org — closes after next Wednesday (Feb. 29).

This is your chance to have a say in what is important to you. Things such as less travel time, a vibrant downtown or cost-efficient infrastructure and public facilities.

You also can indicate your preference for placement of new offices and businesses, as well as levels of density as the region builds out over the coming decades.

The survey, which compares our region”s future scenario based on current trends with three alternatives, will help guide Imagine Greater Tucson on developing a hybrid scenario to address these big picture issues that should have been planned out 40 years ago.
You may ask why this is important now in light of our current economic conditions. The current conditions, in fact, emphasize why addressing this now is more important than ever.

Someone recently stated, “If the economy is good, everything is good,” which is true. Successful people pay taxes on better profitability, which generates more jobs, happy citizens and families and, in turn, funds the safety net needed for those less fortunate.

As the economy builds, regardless of its pace, we have a chance to shape it. We live in a great region, but within that region we must not be blind to the issues we face, such as a lack of resources for needed transportation infrastructure, a lack of funding for landscape improvements on some of our key corridors or roadblocks to improving infill development or better land use planning.

This vision, generated from the voices of literally thousands of local survey participants cannot succeed without your buy-in — and most importantly in my opinion — a voice from the small businesses in this community.

The Imagine Greater Tucson regional visioning process does not stop after the presentation of the hybrid scenario. In fact, the visioning process then moves into its implementation phase.

So it is crucial that you lend your voice in this portion of the visioning process. Your voice can go a long way toward shaping the recommendations that IGT will ask local jurisdictions to consider and incorporate into their respective general or comprehensive plans.

Imagine Greater Tucson is built on the things we all value. I hope you join in on helping to build a stronger foundation for our region”s future to create the community we want.

What is Imagine Greater Tucson?
Imagine Greater Tucson is a community-based effort bringing together citizens, businesses, organizations and regional leaders to share values and work together to create a common vision and action plan for the future of the greater Tucson region.

Why Now?
Over the next several decades, our population is expected to double in size; we must think ahead and proactively influence the changes ahead so we don”t lose what we most value about our region! Imagine Greater Tucson needs your help to make our community a vibrant and healthy place to live, work, learn and play for current and future generations.

How You Can Get Involved
Imagine Greater Tucson is only as powerful as the momentum it can build and that starts with you. Visit the IGT website and sign up to participate in a Community Conversation near you, take an online survey, assist Imagine Greater Tucson at various events, or to help host meetings and share information about the IGT effort. Contact: igt@imaginegreatertucson.org for additional information. See us on Facebook.com/igtucson and Twitter.com/igtucson.

How is Imagine Greater Tucson different from prior visioning/planning efforts?
Imagine Greater Tucson is more than a visioning effort. Through broad-based public involvement, IGT will identify common community values in the region, build and select a preferred scenario to shape our future through action-oriented strategies that will lead to results. This process will build upon existing regional plans. Most importantly, YOU will help identify regional priorities and define the strategies to address regional issues and opportunities.

What is the timeline for the Imagine Greater Tucson process?
October 2010-February 2011 — Phase 1 — INPUT
March 2011-October 2011 — Phase 2 — STRATEGY
November 2011-October 2012 — Phase 3 — ACTION
The public will be involved during all stages of the process, which began with Community Conversations and the Online Survey in Fall 2010.

Is this for Tucson only?
No. The region we live in, and the focus of IGT, includes all of the metropolitan Tucson area, from Green Valley to Saddlebrook, from Vail to Picture Rocks, from the Foothills and Tanque Verde to Tucson Estates and Avra Valley, from Corona de Tucson and Sahuarita to Marana, Oro Valley and Catalina. The Imagine Greater Tucson effort is designed to cover all the people in our region.

How is Imagine Greater Tucson funded?
Imagine Greater Tucson is funded through a diverse array of private, public and non-profit sources. This shared funding model will encourage participation from all sectors of the community. Imagine Greater Tucson will continue to seek public and private sector contributions throughout the process.

Please join us on Sunday, February 19th, after the 5:30 p.m. Civano Soup Supper and Potluck for a presentation by Imagine Greater Tucson, which will begin at 6:30 p.m.

Imagine Greater Tucson Civano Neighborhood Workshop
You”re Invited to Choose How Our Region Grows

It”s time to set a new direction. From January 15-February 29, Imagine Greater Tucson (IGT) needs you to decide how our values and choices shape the region”s future. Make your voice heard!

Thousands have already participated in the IGT process. Together, we”ve discovered our shared values and imagined alternatives to past development patterns. From over 100 collaboratively produced maps for the future, there are now four options that will become ONE shared vision. Now is your chance to influence this community vision for how we grow and inform long-range planning in our region.

Using keypad polling technology, participants will share views on a preferred future for the Greater Tucson Region, how it should grow, and what is important to consider regarding land use.

Please join us for the potluck and stick around for this interactive and important session!

 What will the future look like for the greater Tucson region? Can you imagine the possibilities?
If you”re having trouble visualizing, consider that the local population — now 1 million residents in Pima County — is expected to double over the next decades.

This trajectory presents both significant opportunities and sizeable challenges for the area and has prompted concerned citizens and organizations to take note and start thinking ahead. 

Enter Imagine Greater Tucson — a non-profit, community-based initiative that got underway about two years ago. Its stated purpose is to create a shared vision and clear action for the Tucson region to ensure that it will be a vibrant and healthy place to live, work, learn and play for current and future generations of all ages.

Photo: BalfourWalker.com

Keri Silvyn, an attorney with the firm Lewis & Roca, has been the driving force behind IGT since its inception. Thanks to Silvyn”s leadership, more than 100 individuals and organizations teamed up at the start to move the effort forward. A steering committee comprised of representatives from business, government and the non-profit sector continues to guide the endeavor.

In August, IGT hired Eileen Fagan to serve as executive director of the organization. Fagan came to Tucson from Denver nearly three years ago. She brings more than two decades of experience in marketing in the fields of engineering and urban planning, and has been involved in a number of community enhancement and civic engagement projects throughout her career.

Frequently commuting between Denver and Tucson before relocating here gave Fagan an opportunity to compare and contrast the two cities. 

Denver is a great example of a place that was able to take on tremendous economic transformation and urban renewal relatively quickly, said Fagan. I saw Tucson as having huge potential — but at the time, it had slower forward motion.  

In addition to Denver, IGT organizers researched numerous successful revitalization and visioning projects across the United States and Canada. The outcomes of these initiatives are diverse — they range from changes in public policy for health care to the development of innovative environmental preservation and growth strategies, as well as improvements in transportation.

Robert Grow, founding chair emeritus of a highly regarded Envision Utah project, lent his expertise to help get IGT established.

He said visioning projects commonly look out 25 to 50 years and use a form of reverse engineering to meet a region”s concurrent needs to preserve culture, produce jobs and create better places to live.

Grow said, Visioning provides the chance to stop, take a breath and ask ‘What do we as a community really want?” — rather than wondering and asking, ‘What”s going to happen next?”  

The IGT website suggests possibilities: The process may identify how to benefit, preserve or enhance areas such as the environment (water, land, air), our transportation system, health care access, education, housing — just to name a few possible outcomes.

The IGT approach was organized into three phases; the last slated for completion in the fall of 2012. 

The first phase, currently in progress, is focused on asking citizens to identify core values to uncover what they appreciate most about living in this region. The responses are being captured from facilitated community conversations and through an on-line survey.  

First-phase results will be shared with the public, along with a business as usual model that will illustrate what the region will look like if it stays on its current course for growth. At that point, residents will be asked to determine whether there is a gap between what they value and what will occur if the region does not address impending hurdles or consider viable options for the future.

The second phase will focus on creating alternative scenarios for preserving core values in the long run and a blueprint to assist with the prioritization of issues and the selection of solutions.

The third phase will capitalize on the knowledge gained up to that point and concentrate on developing strategies and a plan of action. 

Once the plan is complete, its various components will be integrated into the work of existing systems, organizations and municipal planning processes. IGT will develop new vehicles and coalitions to accomplish goals as needed.

From the beginning, IGT has been learning from sponsors of previous and existing planning efforts in Southern Arizona, including the Regional Town Hall, Pima Association of Governments (PAG), Tucson Regional Economic Opportunities and Sustainable Tucson. 

IGT is the most comprehensive planning exercise in recent memory, said Andrew Greenhill, chief of staff for the City of Tucson Mayor”s Office. We know from previous exercises, however, that the biggest challenge will be in the implementation. We can all play a role to ensure that it gets done.

Working effectively with scores of stakeholders is a balancing act for a non-partisan, a-political effort. But Fagan says the program has been well received on many fronts and by many jurisdictions. The organization is currently coordinating with the City of Tucson, Pima County, the City of South Tucson, the towns of Marana and Sahuarita, the Tohono O”odham Nation and the Pasqua Yaqui Tribe.

This is a great opportunity for the Tucson Chamber and other entities to find common issues and resolve concerns using a cooperative regional approach, remarked Gary Clark, chairman of the board of the Tucson Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and vice president of Southwest Gas Corporation. But all levels of the business community, from large employers to small, should make their views known.

IGT relies on private and public sources for funding and estimates that the initial process will cost approximately $1.5 million. PAG provided $500,000 in seed money, and others have added to it, including the Thomas R. Brown Foundations with a gift of $25,000 and the Tucson Young Professionals with a pledge of $20,000. IGT has also welcomed a plethora of $5 contributions from individuals attending community briefings. Ongoing support and financial backing are vital to the organization”s continued achievement.

The Caliber Group, Cox Communications and Clear Channel Communications are credited with making substantial investments in the publicity and promotion of the program.

Kerry Stratford, a partner of the marketing agency The Caliber Group, said the outreach strategy for IGT is to encourage the involvement of as many residents in the greater Tucson region as possible. Caliber devised a multi-media campaign consisting of electronic media, billboards, print advertisements and promotional materials, many of which include a QR code that gives mobile phone users convenient access to the electronic survey. 

Even with all of the activity, Fagan insists it is impractical to predict what issues will be ultimately addressed. She acknowledged that some themes have emerged during community conversations and surveys completed to date, including shared affinity for Tucson”s natural surroundings, cultural diversity and ‘small-town” feel. We cannot pre-suppose anything, she said. Right now we are focused on ensuring that all opinions are heard.

You might consider, then, that the future of the Tucson region depends on your voice, your input on what values are most important for the future of the greater Tucson region.

As for the future of IGT itself?

We don”t really know at this point, said Fagan. The continuation of the organization will depend on the outcome of the initial two-year process and the funding available. The form of IGT will likely evolve. Its existence depends on whether it is required to fill a critical need.

Have a voice in planning and shaping the future of the Tucson area with the Imagine Greater Tucson project.

Today on Buckmaster- It”s the Monday Political Face-off featuring commentators Bruce Ash and Paul Eckerstrom. Also, former First Lady of Tucson Beth Walkup talks about the Imagine Greater Tucson survey. Plus, a King Day conversation with community leader and former head of the Tucson Urban League Ray Clarke.

This question arises in the context of debates about whether the provision of amenities will attract the kinds of people who will interact with others in ways that increase productivity and economic growth. From the perspective of Richard Florida, a critical mass of the kinds of people he defines as the creative class, facilitates the sharing of knowledge and key components of both human and cultural capital in ways that not only stimulate innovation, but also attract other members of that class to the community. Members of the creative class are said to be attracted to places that have high levels of diversity and tolerance.

Edward Glaeser also believes that amenities, including the weather play an important role in attracting highly skilled workers. However, climate and consumer oriented amenities are not enough to overcome the attraction of an already established community of peers, such as those that are more likely to be found in economically thriving urban centers.

Of course, more structurally oriented arguments emphasize the role played by the demand for labor generated by an expanding productive sector, perhaps one that reflects a regional competitive advantage. Critics argue that amenities are never enough to attract the creative class—there has to be a supply of well-paying jobs.

Unfortunately, because because economic development in urban areas is generally not the product of well-designed experiments involving random assignment, we are really unable to determine with any confidence what comes first in the causal chain.

Consider the fact that Tucson once ranked third among mid-sized US cities on Florida”s creativity index, but Tucsonans continue to be anxious about our abilility to attract and retain young professionals in our community. Despite the fact that many of our highly marketable graduates had developed their knowledge and skills at the University of Arizona, and despite their familiarity with the unique diversity, tolerance, and natural and cultural amenities of the region, their expectations regarding the possibility of their finding a good job in the region have actually been quite low. The loss of this valuable resource is referred to as a brain drain, and our performance in this area may explain Tucson”s recent decline in creativity rankings.

Because colleges and universities, especially institutions of the first rank like UA, are so important to the development and support of a creative economy, we need to find ways to make the most of what they have to offer. While we may never discover which comes first, if we don”t find ways to partner more closely with this great university to help generate more attractive employment opportunities, we can be sure that our rankings will continue to decline.

A wisely built environment decreases disease burden on a population.  The main health issues of today (obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease) revolve around behavioral choices concerning diet and physical activity.  Physical activity is drastically influenced by our built environment.  Currently, Pima County has a 20% physical inactivity rate (the percentage of adults that do no leisure time physical activity.)The design of a city can either support or discourage activity.  For instance, mixed land use and grid street patterns are associated with higher levels of physical activity.  By providing direct routes to commercial stores, residents of these areas have the option to actively commute.  On the other hand, suburbanization hinders physical activity.  Most suburbs only provide long routes to commercial regions, building a maze of cul-de-sacs and circular street patterns.  The trick to increasing physical activity into a community is to sew it into everyday routines, by building supportive environments.  If you had the ability to walk to the drug store, would you?  If cycling to work took you just as long as driving, would you do it?  With an increase in population, we will need to re-design the structure of region.  Maybe it”s time to consider building a healthy region.

Blog Contributed by IGT Volunteer Michele Scanze