City of Prior Lake seeks public input in updating its strategic plan

Prior Lake American

The city of Prior Lake is thinking hard about its future as it looks to update its 2040 Vision and Strategic Plan. 

The city will host a workshop for stakeholders in the community to discuss an update to the plan next week. The meeting is slated for 5 p.m. Tuesday at Club Prior, 16210 Eagle Creek Ave., Suite 101.

"The vision is really the keel to our sailboat," Prior Lake Mayor Kirt Briggs said. "The 2040 Vision and Strategic Plan weathers the storm through election cycles and council members coming and going and mayors coming and going. It's really the vision that keeps the steady course — it's the continuity piece."

The evening will start with a small dinner provided by the city and a presentation on the early results from the community survey done earlier this year. Before that, the last survey was done in 2014.

"Please be there," Briggs said. "There will be only food and non-alcoholic beverages served, but the city is buying."

More than 100 stakeholders have signed up to be part of the round-table discussion on specific elements within the vision, which include community assets, economic and community development, effective city resources, natural resources, transportation, communication and more.

"It's a very significant document in that it is contained as part of our comprehensive plan, which is really the multi-part plan that the Met Council, under state statute, requires us to have to identify what it is we want to be when we grow up and when we grow up is supposed to be around, or about the year, 2040," Prior Lake City Manager Frank Boyles said.

How it works 

Stakeholders, which include not only Prior Lake residents but representatives from around the city, county and state that are involved with Prior Lake, will discuss vision elements in three 20-minutes rounds with the city facilitating.

After the three segments are over, city staff and consultants will give a brief presentation on what they heard during the round table discussions. At that point, any resident or attendee will be able to chime in with their opinion regarding the topics.

"If you can think about a person who might be a stakeholder in some aspect of the city of Prior Lake, we're trying to invite them to participate in this event," Boyles said. "We want, to the extent we possibly can, capture the diversity of perspectives and expertise that are present in the community."

Consultants will take the information from the workshop and will work with city staff and council on Oct. 26 to refine the elements. At a time after that, a draft will be made up and sent to those who marked that they were attending the workshop for their input.

"We are not guaranteeing that all of those things will happen...but at least that they will be considered by the city council," Boyles said. "We'll get that input back, incorporate it into our findings and then, finally, with the revised, revised vision go to the city council and ask them to approve the document for printing." 

Once the document is printed, it will be sent to all residents in Prior Lake and some businesses.

What it means 

The vision and strategic plan are part of the comprehensive plan, the overall planning document for the city that charts a course for the next 20 or so years of the city's life, updated periodically along the way. The vision is also part of the capital improvement plan.

"You hold all your decisions up against your vision," Briggs said.

The vision is more specific in that it allows staff to identify short-, medium- and long-range objectives, some of which can be clearly put on and marked off a to-do list of sorts, Boyles said.

"We can see what's being proposed and we can say 'done' or 'undone,'" Boyles said.

Briggs said he is hoping as many people as can make it to the meeting will come.

"I'm hoping for a packed room and to include some folks that have never visited our city hall," Briggs said. "If there's one meeting to show up to, show up for this one."

People come into city hall, generally, when they have issues with what's being done but this meeting is a chance for them to talk about opportunities for the future, Briggs said.

"That, to me, is a very different conversation and an important one for us to have with our community — the opportunity for who we want to be is in our hands," Briggs said. "Don't miss the opportunity to set us in the right direction."