Dear Readers –
Today is the
ten year anniversary of the newsletter part of the Regions Work Initiative. It
is, among other things, an effort to make the notion of "regional
community” a viable term relating to community development at
multi-jurisdictional scales
Part of that
success had to do with a retreat from the fear that the Planning District
Commission would become a directly elected Service District Commission, as had
been provided for in the 1968 Virginia Area Development Act. Planning District
Commissions which, at the start, could not implement programs were given that
authority in legislation.
It was also
assisted by my creation of the regional name "Northern Shenandoah
Valley" in 1983. That became an everyday community identifier, now
extensively used in business advertising.
Such regional
community emergence was occurring in other Virginia Planning Districts, as well
as for Regional Councils and Councils of Government throughout the U.S. in the
1990's.
In total I
could see that, regions did work, yet a question was: "What's a
region?" Academics and pundits of various stripes thought that the boundaries
of existing regional councils were all wrong.
At the 1998
World Future Society Conference in Chicago I began to explore this question
with the launch of the Regions Work Initiative, an individual effort.
November 11,
2003, the on-line newsletter Regional Community News was begun, noting:"The focus is on things done at the
multi-jurisdiction regional level in the U.S. and around the world." It
was based on the TransportationCommunications
Newsletter published by Bernie Wagenblast, which is still going strong.
January 4, 2006, the term “Development"
was added, since that appeared to be a key objective of regional efforts. In
2008, I committed to another five years, which bring us to this day, November
11, 2013.
In 2012, the
effort became: Greater/Regional Community Motivation
- News and Thought. Distribution of new stories shifted to a daily stream via Twitter, Flipboard and Google+.
Thought pieces are on the blog and distributed via Yahoo
Groups.
Another
concept I sought to develop has been a geocode to enable aggregation of data by
political geography, since alphabetic FIPS codes could not do so.
Success can be
reported in this area with the upcoming publication of: “Prototype Global
Coding of Political Geographies for Library and Data Management-Wikipedia
Example” in the Papers of the Applied Geography Conferences. Materials are
online http://goo.gl/7C0iIE.
These efforts
will continue. There is a growing need for human unity and cooperation in the
world. Community motive, the term used by Aldo Leopold in 1944, is another
concept that would benefit the world, as it balances the lesser profit motive.
Feedback is
always welcome.
Sincerely
Dear Readers –
Today is the
ten year anniversary of the newsletter part of the Regions Work Initiative. It
is, among other things, an effort to make the notion of "regional
community” a viable term relating to community development at
multi-jurisdictional scales
.
This term
comes from my experience as a regional planner for Virginia Planning District
7, then the Lord Fairfax Planning District Commission, where I began work in
1973
.
By the early
1990’s, after two decades of being together as a regional commission, the
region began to make progress on a number of joint projects including: management
of a regional tire shredder, a Minimum Instream Flow Study for the North Fork
of the Shenandoah River, a Civil War Battlefields Heritage plan, and VDOT
funded rural transportation planning for the Planning Districts.
Part of that
success had to do with a retreat from the fear that the Planning District
Commission would become a directly elected Service District Commission, as had
been provided for in the 1968 Virginia Area Development Act. Planning District
Commissions which, at the start, could not implement programs were given that
authority in legislation.
It was also
assisted by my creation of the regional name "Northern Shenandoah
Valley" in 1983. That became an everyday community identifier, now
extensively used in business advertising.
Such regional
community emergence was occurring in other Virginia Planning Districts, as well
as for Regional Councils and Councils of Government throughout the U.S. in the
1990's.
In total I
could see that, regions did work, yet a question was: "What's a
region?" Academics and pundits of various stripes thought that the boundaries
of existing regional councils were all wrong.
At the 1998
World Future Society Conference in Chicago I began to explore this question
with the launch of the Regions Work Initiative, an individual effort.
November 11,
2003, the on-line newsletter Regional Community News was begun, noting:"The focus is on things done at the
multi-jurisdiction regional level in the U.S. and around the world." It
was based on the TransportationCommunications
Newsletter published by Bernie Wagenblast, which is still going strong.
January 4, 2006, the term “Development"
was added, since that appeared to be a key objective of regional efforts. In
2008, I committed to another five years, which bring us to this day, November
11, 2013.
In 2012, the
effort became: Greater/Regional Community Motivation
- News and Thought. Distribution of new stories shifted to a daily stream via Twitter, Flipboard and Google+.
Thought pieces are on the blog and distributed via Yahoo
Groups.
Another
concept I sought to develop has been a geocode to enable aggregation of data by
political geography, since alphabetic FIPS codes could not do so.
Success can be
reported in this area with the upcoming publication of: “Prototype Global
Coding of Political Geographies for Library and Data Management-Wikipedia
Example” in the Papers of the Applied Geography Conferences. Materials are
online http://goo.gl/7C0iIE.
These efforts
will continue. There is a growing need for human unity and cooperation in the
world. Community motive, the term used by Aldo Leopold in 1944, is another
concept that would benefit the world, as it balances the lesser profit motive.
Feedback is
always welcome.
Sincerely
Tom
Christoffel, FeRSA, AICP, Editor
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