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• Champaign Tomorrow gives a new voice to the community

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Lacey Rains, city planner for champaigntomorrow.com. Photo courtesy of Lacey Rains.

Are you interested in contributing your thoughts and ideas about the future growth and development of Champaign? A newly-developed website by the City of Champaign, called Champaign Tomorrow, allows you to suggest future projects. This site is part of a community-wide effort, initiated by the city, to plan for the future growth and development of the City of Champaign. Whether you’re a long-time resident or have recently moved to the community, your opinions and contributions will be invaluable to this planning process.

The goal of the website is to engage the public in planning for the future of this community in a way that is easy, convenient and accessible to the majority of Champaign residents. Online surveys and questions gather input to determine the kinds of places the public would like to see more of or less of, how planning choices affect their everyday lives and essentially what they value. The information gathered through this website, public meetings and other outreach efforts will be used to update the City’s Comprehensive Plan. The Comprehensive Plan is a document that includes guiding principles, based on the values and preferences of Champaign residents as well as policies and maps to guide where development should go and what the City of Champaign should be like within the next 15-20 years. The plan is used by staff, elected officials and developers everyday to make decisions.

The website has lots of ways for citizens to participate to make sure that the plan reflects their interests. From a link on the homepage, take the PLACES Survey to give your preferences on the places you live, shop, work and play in Champaign. “A Day-In-The-Life” section has simulations illustrating a day in the life of five typical Champaign residents. Then blog about a day in your life — is it similar or different from these characters? Read other people’s posts as well. The Community Mapper tool is a visual and interactive way to tell the city, geographically, what you think. Create a map of Champaign showing the specific locations you like or dislike. Also, share areas you would like to see redeveloped and why. What should areas of the city be like in the future? “I think the mapping tool will generate some of the most interesting feedback that we can use for the Future Land Use section of the comprehensive plan,” said Lacey Raines, a Planner II for the City of Champaign and Project Manager for the Champaign Tomorrow Comprehensive Plan update.

The website also features a wealth of information, including power point presentations, articles, reports and other documents, that will be updated as the process continues through Summer 2009.

“Overall, we hope the website will engage the public in planning for their future,” said Raines, who is currently working on marketing for the website. “We also hope it encourages participation in our face-to-face workshops and generally builds support for the Plan and the tough decisions that may need to be made to implement the Plan.” Participants can register on the site to be part of the project’s e-mail list to stay informed and be involved with the workshops, public meetings and other activities that will occur in the future.