Growth plan to guide city's future

Ever wonder what Bloomington will look like in 10 years?\nFor the past two years, citizens, businesses and city government officials have been discussing the issues that will guide the next decade of city policy.\nThe end product of those discussions is the Growth Policies Plan (GPP). It states a vision of Bloomington and sets long-term goals for the city. It provides policy-makers with a clear idea of what they are working toward.\nBut there are different people with different visions for the future of Bloomington, and it was evident when 211 amendments were submitted to the city planning commission.\nMost of the amendments came from a broad spectrum of interest groups, such as political parties and neighborhood and business associations. One such group is a coalition created to address the GPP. Its members are the Greater Bloomington Chamber of Commerce, the Bloomington Economic Development Corp. and the Bloomington Board of Realtors. Together, the coalition represents more than 1,000 business entities and has been an active voice throughout the planning process.\n"The problem we have is two-fold," coalition spokesman John West said. "It's the content and the process by which this new version will be adopted."\nThe city planning commission changed the process by which public input and amendments were considered to accommodate the number of issues.\n"They really disrupted the game plan of anybody that had spent some time making their proposals and getting their ducks in a row," West said.\nNot expecting so many amendments from the public, the commission said its plan to study and hear comments on each amendment individually was not feasible.\n"I think it was unfortunate that the process changed," planning commission member Jeffery Willsey said. "Once the staff saw the magnitude of the job to conduct a full hearing on the motions, they realized the plan, as it stood, needed a lot of work."\nWillsey said much public input was heard during the document's conception, but the quantity of input does not reflect its impact on the current draft.\n"There were sit-down conversations that went into the plan. Discussion was taken, but it was not fully responded to," Willsey said. "I would draw different conclusions (from those conversations) than what was in the draft."\nNow that the process is changed, West said the coalition and other groups are ready to shift their focus to the content of the plan.\nWest said if this current draft were adopted as it stands, the coalition would support it, but it would still have concerns over three aspects of the plan: the vision statement, how economic development is addressed and the idea of bicycling as an adequate substitute to driving.\nThe coalition said the vision statement was too broad and lacked substance.\n"It's very weak on the topic of job creation and retention; it doesn't really step up and make that a priority," West said.\nAngela Parker, who chairs the Bloomington Chamber of Commerce board of directors, said many of the things the city envisions must be achieved through economic development. \n"Quality of life is inextricably linked to economic growth," Parker said. "The GPP doesn't do enough, in our view, to promote that growth."\nCity officials believe economic growth has been addressed in the document.\n"We need to preserve land in our community for employment-related growth," city planning director Tom Micuda said. "The plan sets aside land for economic growth."\nMicuda said other provisions in the plan, such as promoting downtown development and tax-abatement issues, will also provide the kinds of economic tools that allow businesses to thrive in Bloomington.\nAside from those issues, Micuda said the vision statement was meant to be broad, not targeting specific concerns.\nWillsey agrees a broad vision statement should not accommodate specific concerns.\n"I'm not convinced that the GPP is the place where you would address those (economic development) issues, but there are certainly policies that could go into it that would promote those things," Willsey said.\nThe GPP includes more than 20 references to bicycle traffic, but West said the coalition does not think providing bike paths is a feasible solution to alleviating traffic problems.\n"Its somebody's utopian vision," West said "The average homeowner has two cars. They aren't going to sell one of them and buy bikes."\nNationally, .4 percent of the population rides a bike opposed to some other means of transportation, West said.\nParker said most important thing right now is for people to sit down and talk about the issues together.\n"People may say, 'This doesn't affect me,' " Parker said. "Well, not yet. But the ordinances that will flow from this document will eventually affect us all"