Thrive2050 - The Changes Still Needed

"Too Important To Rush Through"

Update: 3/2/22: The Council held another worksession on the Thrive draft and voted to delay the vote on Thrive until May 19, 2022 (with the opportunity to vote on further continuances) so that a consultant can be hired to conduct the outreach called for in the Office of Legislative Oversight report on Racial Equity and Social Justice (RESJ). The report from the consultant is expected by July 1.

We celebrate that an equity chapter will be added as part of meeting the RESJ recommendations but there are still a lot of other edits the current draft needs and those will be taken up at a Council worksession on April 5. There is still time to advocate for a plan that holistically moves our County forward.

We respectfully demand that chapters on the environment, food security, water resources and climate resilience that were inextricably stripped from the working draft be re-integrated before the plan is approved.

This plan is not complete without the equity piece, it is also not a comprehensive forward looking document if it does not address how we eat, drink and breathe in the future.


Your voice is needed to make this a plan that takes our County forward. As written, this plan is not ready for passage. Click "Start Writing" to contact the Council before April 5.

Background:

Why We Need to Restore the Environmental/Climate/Food System Chapters
The Working Plan draft crafted by planning staff and released for public comment in 2020, while not perfect, had action items that would provide climate and food system resilience, water and forest protection along with equity and more. The draft sent to the Council - did not- whole chapters - notably about the environment, were stripped from the plan. One would ask, who asked for the environmental chapters to be removed and to what end? Without these chapters taking on critical concerns, Thrive is a shadow of the general plans of neighboring jurisdictions. A word count between drafts quantitively shows the deficiencies of the plan in front of the council.

We actually had a proponent of the current draft say, "Well, the environment chapters of Thrive were taken out as it is more of a housing plan." This is a stunning misunderstanding of the process. Thrive is not a housing plan - it is an update to the general plan and needs to tackle all topics. Environmental protection left on the cutting room floor does not make for a plan that meets our moment.

The final deliberations on Thrive will be happening in the coming weeks and months. the Council needs to hear from you before the next planned worksession on April 5. For all our Thrive posts click here

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