Community Vision

Community vision and goals

Community vision and goals are essential to planning for development and for operation of public services. Many in El Dorado Hills feel that the County's needs to recognize more clearly their own vision, values, and goals.

An example was the answer to a single show-of-hands question at the January, 2007 Citizens Alliance meeting. The question was at the broadest possible level, asking for a yes/no response to a multi-faceted issue: "Does the County General Plan provide for too much growth in and around El Dorado Hills?" The answer was unanimous, all in attendance said yes. For many this refers to total levels of population growth, to others the question is not of total growth but rather of balanced growth. The most sensitive area among imbalances is development of road system capacity too late to accommodate the need induced by housing and business growth.

Citizen values include strong emphasis on quality of life factors rather than purely economic factors. These two classes of values are mutually compatible.

For example, a 2004 study by Dr. Robert Fountain and the Sacramento Regional Research Institute for the City of Folsom ("Folsom Economic Development and Industry Study". This reported results of a survey of business and industry in Folsom, reporting in part that "The two most widely stated locational advantages of the City were the community qualities of Folsom and access to markets and customers. ... These respondents noted the small town atmosphere and values found in the City as well as a high feeling of safety." The Citizens Alliance commends these values.

Another more significant example is embodied in the current "Maui County 2030 General Plan Update". What was initiated in 2002 in a conference on "Maui's Economic Future" produced an extensive public outreach process in 2003, titled "Focus Maui Nui" (Focus Greater Maui). This county, about 90% as populous as El Dorado County, trained volunteer facilitators and conducted 167 focus group sessions, actively discussing and collecting information on public values, visions, and goals from about 1,700 residents. This guided drafting of updates to the Maui County General Plan.

Three of the most appropriate web references for the Maui General Plan and related documents are:

Root page for General Plan documents: http://www.mauicounty.gov/departments/Planning/gp2030/info.htm
Executive Summary of Focus Maui Nui: http://www.mauicounty.gov/departments/Planning/pdf/FMNexec.pdf
Introduction to Draft Countywide Policy Plan: http://www.mauicounty.gov/departments/Planning/pdf/polsec1.pdf

The Focus Maui Nui outreach process was influential in shaping details of this basic list of countywide General Plan policy goal categories, cited in this order in the Introduction to the Draft Countywide Policy Plan:

Education
Natural Environment
Social Services and Public Facilities
Physical Infrastructure
Cultural Preservation
Transportation Planning
Population & Land Use Management
Economic Development
Housing Opportunities
Planning & Good Governance

General Plan content is clearly based on these mutually coexistent goals. The Citizens Alliance feels that such a list for El Dorado Hills citizens would be generally similar. A very substantial proportion feel that El Dorado County has overemphasized economic development, especially through housing construction, and has underemphasized road system development and protection of the natural environment.

We recommend strongly that El Dorado County conduct a public outreach study similar to Focus Maui Nui, at least in El Dorado Hills and preferably throughout the County.