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A year certainly does go by quickly and with it goes hopes, dreams, accomplishments, and failures. It’s been just over a year that I first sat in this chair as First Selectman – a year to carry out commitments, goals, and dreams. As the new year approaches and new goals are set, I thought I’d share with you what has been achieved, where the initial goals have not been met, and which will be moved forward into 2009.
I had set twenty-three very ambitious and challenging goals for the past year. Of those twenty-three -- sixteen have been totally met, five have been partially met but need more work, and two have not even been started. So what are they?
Communications (7 goals). Five of these goals were met by building a user friendly, timely, and informative website, developing a communications plan, writing a weekly column, providing regular press releases, and working in partnership with the local weekly newspapers. The partially met goal involves regular face-to-face opportunities to interact informally with residents. Coffees held several times a month with various locations, times, and days is a first step towards the achievement of this goal. The second step is to visit you at your home through door-to-door days. This continues to be a goal for the coming year – not everyone can get to Town Hall, to a coffee, or to a community event.
One of the two goals that were not met this year was to institute monthly “Meet Our Department” sessions for residents to meet department heads and get first hand updates. We have partially met this in that a different department head attends each of the coffees giving residents a chance to chat and ask questions. However, having done this now for a year, I don’t believe holding another monthly meeting is a valuable, effective way of connecting you to our various departments. Building those connections and allowing you easy access continues to be a goal for this year though we will explore alternate methods of meeting that goal. This and increasing the usefulness of our website are my two communication goals for the coming year.
Economic Development (4 goals). This area continues to be one of emphasis. Two goals were met – creating a Business Development Task Force (BDTF) and a Lebanon Avenue Revitalization Committee (LARC) – and two goals partially met – establish a Main Street Coalition and convene a meeting of developers. The LARC developed a plan which was been turned into a grant request. While we did not get the grant this past year, we have continued to work with the State offices to fine-tune and develop a comprehensive plan for next year’s grant request and any others that might arise in the meantime. The BDTF has been meeting for a year and will be submitting their recommendations to the Board of Selectmen this month. We are looking forward to those recommendations as I am sure they will
provide the basis for additional goals for the coming year.
The two partially met areas include establishing a Main Street Coalition and convening a meeting with developers to discuss a variety of topics around the future of Colchester and improving services. While the Board of Selectmen did create the Coalition, it has not yet been filled nor activated. Regarding meeting with developers, Adam Turner, Town Planner, and I have regular meetings with developers, including conversations about how we can provide better service. We have not however convened a meeting.
Going into the next year, we will fill and activate the Main Street Coalition; however, I am finding that one-on-one meetings with developers are providing more needed information and two-way conversation than would convening a meeting of developers. While in these economic times there appears to be little activity, we continue to work daily with developers who are planning for the future so that we are poised for action once the economy begins to recover.
Additionally, we’ve created a brochure for staff and volunteers to use when approaching developers, are working to update the website with “developer needed” information, passed business park zoning, received a $50,000 grant to compile current resources and develop regulations for “Work Force Housing”, submitted a $50,000 grant to begin restoration of the Old Firehouse, and continue to streamline Planning & Zoning processes for our customers.
Next week I’ll discuss the remaining twelve goals in the categories of finance, involvement, and services. If you have any questions or comments, please let me know. The purpose of these goals is to provide you with the best service we possibly can – so if you have ideas, thoughts, suggestions on how we can best do that, I’d love to hear from you (selectman@colchesterct.gov or 537-7220).
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