The first Imagine Austin Community Forum Series was held November 9 - 12, 2009, and consisted of six meetings in different locations and times. After a brief introduction by the consultants from WRT, more than 300 participants worked in small groups to identify:

• Strengths: the things that make Austin great, that need to be preserved or enhanced in the future.
• Challenges: the things that Austin must overcome as it moves into the future.
• Imagining 2039: imagining what Austin would be like in the future, if the results from these meetings result in positive changes.

Introductory presentation

See the handout given out at the meetings: it provides some context for the meeting, as well as an overview of the plan schedule.

Meeting results

The raw results from the first Community Forum Series are available for download (Excel file). The data is organized with a separate worksheet for each venue. These results were also posted to the Imagine Austin blog to invite public review and reflection:

• Austin strengths
• Austin challenges
• Austin in 2039

Who attended?

More than 300 participants attended the first community forum series; click to learn about them.

To see the breakdown of participants across each venue, click the link under each picture below.

A Kick-Off Survey and Meetings-in-a-Box were used to broaden public input during this part of the process. Parts of Austin that did not attend these public meetings in November were targeted to ensure that the Austin public at large was represented as well as possible.

Geographic distribution of participations in the first Community Forums

  

Monday, November 9
Baty Elementary (36 participants in southeast Austin)		Westwood High (35 participants in northwest Austin)
Tuesday, November 10
St. David's Episcopal Church (73 participants in central Austin)		Bowie High (60 participants in southwest Austin)
Thursday, November 12
Travis High (53 participants in central Austin)		Reagan High (59 participants in northeast Austin)