The Free Press, Mankato, MN

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April 25, 2006

Our View -- Envision 2020: Promise and progress

A group of your neighbors has been meeting about once a month to help plan and decide the future of the place you live.

Their efforts are impressive so far.

The Envision 2020 group was formed to help the Mankato region gather the best ideas from its residents and help map out a plan for the future with the goal of making the Mankato region a prosperous, healthy, aesthetically pleasing place to live.

The group was formed by a handful of community leaders and expanded to include some 150 additional area residents who had an interest in being part of the planning process. The participants represented a good majority of the interest groups and viewpoints in the Mankato region.

The group hired a professional coordinator through the National Civic League who manages the discussion and helps small groups form specific plans. The meetings have been taking place since January and are scheduled to conclude in June with a final report coming out this fall.

Goals will be outlined and strategies developed.

So far, the group has identified Key Performance Areas that include transportation, economic development, livability, health and human services, education and community planning/regional governance.

Committees in each of these areas have defined goals that include, for example, in economic development, attracting industries that match the rather high education level in Mankato. Other goals in that area call for supporting small business and entrepreneurs. In the area of planning, there is a call for the creation of urban villages that encourage pedestrian movement.

Some of the goals call for making Mankato a good place not just for the young, but for the elderly, aiming to create more regionally connected transportation systems and helping plan for the aging of the population with access to health care.

In the area of education, the group has outlined worthy goals of bringing sons and daughters back to Mankato and connecting education with regional job needs.

The livability committee calls for affordable housing, entertainment, diversity, arts and culture and green space.

If even half of the group’s plans are implemented at some point, the Mankato region will be a much better place to live. It’s already not a bad place to live, but this planning process could bring the community to the next level.˙

Envision 2020 is a worthwhile endeavor and a great start to a great future for the region.

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