Carrie’s decision to run for local election was prompted by frustration with a northern Town Council that too often overlooked social issues and quality of life in favour of economic development. As a young woman in her 20’s she also felt it was important to broaden the diversity in her community.

Upon retiring as a high school teacher, Bill made the decision to throw his hat in the ring in order to pursue a lifelong interest in politics. On the other hand, Tracey, an avid volunteer, had never even thought about running until someone asked her to consider it.

At a recent meeting, I listened as participants took turns providing updates on their work as it related to community capacity building. One government employee reported that a clear direction was being communicated at a number of different levels. The direction she and others were hearing? Action! Enough research and planning already!

Elected officials and senior staff were conveying that they wanted to see new or improved programs and initiatives delivering relevant and meaningful outcomes related to individual, social, economic and environmental well-being. Apparently, their current focus on research and conducting needs assessment was too often resulting in “analysis… More Posted on 06-21-10

It was a Good Plan

My husband and I are working hard to re-enter the real world as we’ve just returned from a fabulous vacation in Mexico. Having recently experienced a lack of life balance, simply anticipating the week had provided serious incentive for hanging on. However, being so busy also meant that while we had managed to book the flights and hotel, we hadn’t done much else in terms of planning our itinerary.  Or perhaps we had? 

If planning is addressing the gap in between where one is now, and where one wants to go, we did have a plan. We were stressed… More Posted on 06-14-10