On Tuesday, October 20th the Prince William Board of County Supervisors met for their third and final meting of the month. On the agenda was a presentation by Reverend Andra Hoxie an Occoquan District Appointee, Martin Jeter a Coles District Appointee, and Kaye Wallace the Strategic Plan Coordinator on the 2021-2024 Strategic Plan Update.

Wallace stated that “The objectives for our presentation today are 1) to review the strategic plan timeline 2) to review the community engagement process and share what we learned from the community input 3) to share recommended strategic goal areas as well as vision and values statements for the next strategic plan and 4) to remind you all of next steps in the process.”

She reminded everyone that “the county’s strategic planning process was disrupted by the pandemic” and adjustments to the process made as a result.

Explaining further that “we worked with the office of publication” in order “to gather the community’s input on what should be in the next plan.” Adapting to the circumstances of COVID-19 “we utilized two methods of engagement with the community: one method was an online community survey, the second method were online community conversations where each supervisor hosted one or more of these sessions in his or her magisterial district.”

Jeter explained that on the community survey “we asked two primary questions: ‘What should be the top five focus areas of the county over the next for years?’ and two ‘What else should we consider as we develop the strategic plan?’”

“The top five selected [for question one] were number ‘safe and secure community,’ number two ‘schools and quality education,’ number three ‘mobility,’ number four ‘economic development,’ [and] number five ‘environmental conservation.’”

“The second question was more open ended to solicit additional input.” Below is a slide showing some of the most frequent responses to it. “Instead of just having strict categories to choose from, residents were able to expand on their thoughts and provide us more context and details.”

The other method of obtaining input was through ‘Community Conversations,’ we covered one of the with Chair Ann Wheeler in August. Each session asked the same set of questions, shown below.

“What we were heard from the residents in our community conversations with the various supervisors covered a wide range of topics” continued Jeter. “However there were some topics that arose as common priorities.” Although there were significant differences in responses “There was also a good amount of overlap amongst the responses from the different districts.”

Hoxie said “Based upon all the input we received the team recommends that the 2021-2024 strategic plan have the following set of focus areas,” shown below.

Continuing on to say “Pursuant to the Board’s resolution on June 16th, 2020 we will be using an equity lens as we develop the strategic objectives and goals in each of these focus areas that we mention.”

“The key themes in the focus areas,” shown below “show what we heard, not necessarily what will recommend” said Hoxie.

From the process the Strategic Plan Development Team (SPDT) recommends the following vision and values statements for the 2021-2024 Strategic Plan, shown below.

Wallace concluded, “regarding the next steps in the process” that “the team will continue to gather and assess data that will contribute to goal development.” The SPDT “will draft a plan and then present the draft to the board and the community to solicit feedback on that draft before we finalize that plan.”