The Next 20 Years, and Why It’s Time to Invest in Cedar Falls Again
What makes a community a great place to live? Is it safe neighborhoods? Good schools? Low cost of living? Good jobs? Activities for young families, professionals, and senior residents? Great trail systems and outdoor recreational amenities? A diverse mix of experiences and cultures?
I believe it’s all the above.
But none of these things come about by accident. They are the result of a community that is working together to build the future it wants to see for itself. And the beautiful community that we have today is the result of decades of resident leadership that made smart, forward-thinking investments that have paid off for the last 20 years.
But what do the next 20 years look like? What is the shared vision that we have for Cedar Falls over the next several decades? What are the major themes and priorities that we want to work toward?
Is it the best neighborhood parks and green spaces of any city in the Midwest, with more river recreation and entertainment options to bring new residents and tourists to Cedar Falls?
Is it a growing business & industry base and vibrant small business community that provide some of the best professional opportunities to grow your career here?
Is it some of the best housing availability with a vibrant mix of bustling downtown living and quiet, away-from-it-all acreages, amazing senior living communities, and affordable starter homes in close-knit neighborhoods for young families to raise their kids?
Is it a thriving University with a growing student population that helps reinvigorate an eclectic and unique College Hill district? And a redeveloped College Square Mall area at the core of our city that houses a mix of new living options and mixed-use commercial space?
All of that is for us to decide. And it starts with rebuilding a shared vision for Cedar Falls.
But what does that look like? It’s easy to say we need a shared vision, but what does that mean beyond the buzz words? It means we need to reengage as a community to decide what direction we want to work toward. We can’t do everything all at once, so what are our specific goals and priorities that we want to focus on for the next 20 years? What are the major themes like community parks and family activities or expanded business & career opportunities that are most important to us?
Here are the first steps I believe we need to take to get us there:
It starts with residents. We need to bring together a formal visioning process with broad input from residents of all different backgrounds, ages, income levels, beliefs and cultures to see what issues and aspects of our community people would like to see focused on most. What are our biggest challenges and opportunities that we want to prioritize? These priorities can then serve as the basis for the next step of turning that vision into a reality - a plan.
Next we need to rebuild our city’s Comprehensive Plan based on the goals and priorities of residents (the current Comprehensive Plan was created over a decade ago in 2012). This is where the rubber meets the road. How do we translate the vision residents have for Cedar Falls into an actionable, prioritized plan of strategies and direction to guide us forward for the coming decade? Some opportunities may be immediate, short-term actions that we can take, but some may be long-term, transformative initiatives that will require a 5 to 10 year commitment to see come to fruition.
And with an updated Comprehensive Plan in place, Staff and City Council can start to prioritize their time on the most important issues with clear direction from residents. We can start to prioritize our 5-year Capital Improvement Plan to focus on the most important initiatives and projects that we have based on resident input rather than being reactive to issues as they come up. And we can begin to proactively work with business and community partners to find creative ways to address major initiatives like housing and the redevelopment of College Hill and College Square Mall.
And lastly but perhaps most importantly, we need to be intentional about staying focused on our goals as a City. To quote Dwight D. Eisenhower, “Plans are useless, but planning is essential”. It’s not enough to have a plan - we need to ensure the processes are in place for us to stay focused on the plan and the priorities that residents have for Cedar Falls. Our current Goal Setting process that we do each year is a piece of that, but I would like to see us also commit to quarterly one-day work sessions with staff leadership and City Council to ensure we’re making progress on our priorities with more visibility and accountability with residents on that progress.
And if we can come together over a new shared vision and priorities for Cedar Falls, I believe it’s time for us to start investing in ourselves again.
But that doesn’t mean blindly spending money on projects and initiatives, and it certainly doesn’t mean growth at all costs. To the contrary, it means making smart, intentional investments that will payoff for improving the quality of life and long-term physical, mental, and financial well-being of our residents.
It means prioritizing projects that have the biggest impact and lowest long-term cost, such as prioritizing in-fill development for new housing where infrastructure is cheaper to build and maintain versus new expansion at the edge of town. It means working closely with resident groups, businesses and developers to incentivize their private dollars to invest in Cedar Falls alongside tax dollars, and being proactive about leveraging grants and funding from State and National partners and foundations to minimize the tax impact on residents.
It means thinking long-term about how projects like the new whitewater and shoreline improvements to the Cedar River will drive more investment and tourism in our downtown, and being proactive about addressing the need for better parking options to accommodate the additional residents, business employees, and visitors as our downtown continues to grow.
Because at the end of the day, if we aren’t willing to invest in ourselves no one else will. And having grown up and spent most of my life here, Cedar Falls is a community I know is worth investing in. And it all starts with us deciding what we want our future to look like.
