La Crosse, WI (April 2022): The City of La Crosse has begun the process of updating Confluence, the City of La Crosse’s Comprehensive Plan via Forward La Crosse, a campaign to encourage public involvement in the planning process.
The Forward La Crosse Campaign will serve to update “Confluence” adopted in 2002. This campaign, with the help of the citizens of La Crosse, WI, will create an action plan guiding decision making and investment.
The campaign will address issues and opportunities, housing, transportation, economic development, intergovernmental cooperation, land use, utilities, community facilities, agricultural, natural and cultural resources, and plan implementation.
The City of La Crosse Planning and Development Department is launching its public engagement campaign, to collect feedback and input from the citizens of La Crosse.
Through this campaign, residents will help answer key questions including:
- What are you excited for about La Crosse’s Future?
- What do you value or love about La Crosse?
- What topics should this plan address over the next ten or twenty years?
- What are your no rules, out of the box, anything is possible, vision for La Crosse?
- What is one improvement to make life better here?
- How can we improve the quality of life or make La Crosse a more desirable place to move to and stay?
Community feedback will be collected from; focus groups, resident panels, online surveys, interviews, and other engagement opportunities. Citizens of La Crosse and other key stakeholders in the community are encouraged to reach out and visit forwardlacrosse.org for more opportunities to provide feedback and participate in the formation of Forward La Crosse.
The City of La Crosse Planning and Development Department understands that this campaign takes collaboration and needs the public’s input to shape La Crosse’s future. To accommodate the ever changing status of COVID-19, in addition to in-person meetings the City will include multiple public engagement opportunities including multi-media marketing, social media, resident panels, interviews, and focus groups. Visitors to forwardlacrosse.org may check for project updates, a project timeline, upcoming events, and ways community members may participate. The data collected from the campaign will be used by The City of La Crosse to refresh goals and actions.
Visitors to forwardlacrosse.org will also have the opportunity to access interactive features designed to make providing feedback simple, easy, and fun. Community members can leave comments and photos on a digital map module of La Crosse highlighting opportunities for parks and recreation, historic preservation, transportation, and more. Community members can also share their priorities over the next few years via the “voting game.”
Finally, a detailed survey module will offer community members the chance to share insights about what life is like in La Crosse and what they hope to see in the future. All of the results from these modules will be integrated into the final Comprehensive Plan. All of these features are mobile-friendly and available for translation via Google Translate.
About the Campaign
Assisting in the campaign is a Milwaukee, WI based company GRAEF. GRAEF is a multi-discipline engineering, planning, and design firm. In 1961, GRAEF began as an individual partnership founded by three structural engineers in Milwaukee, WI. Today, GRAEF is an international firm with nearly 300 employees in ten offices located in the Midwest, Florida and Turks and Caicos. (https://graef-usa.com).
Locally, River Travel Media based out of La Crosse, Wisconsin was hired for brand development, website design, content creation, public relations, and other media and marketing services. River Travel Media is led by award-winning marketing professionals and serves regional clients in Minnesota and Wisconsin. River Travel Media also publishes River Travel Magazine which attracts active travel enthusiasts interested in food, shopping, and entertainment on America’s Rivers and Tributaries. River Travel Media also hosts the podcast “La Crosse Local” which is an arts, food, and entertainment podcast and publication for La Crosse County and its surrounding communities (https://rivertravelmedia.com).
Both entities were selected via a Request for Proposal (RFP) from the City of La Crosse Planning and Development Department.
About the City of La Crosse Planning and Development Department
The mission of the City of La Crosse Planning and Development Department is to improve the conditions of life in La Crosse through expert advisement of economic, environmental, and social data, through recommendations to the public, policymakers, and partners, and to foster a civic spirit that desires a condition of sustained improvement to the city for future generations.
Services include Community Development & Housing, Economic Development, Heritage Preservation, and planning.
Media Contact:
Tim Acklin, AICP
Planning Administrator
City of La Crosse Planning and Development
400 La Crosse St. La Crosse, WI 54601
608-789-7391
www.cityoflacrosse.org