This month, the RM of Ritchot launched two new master plans designed to help improve life for its residents. Over the coming weeks, people who live in the municipality will be asked to engage in the development process through meetings, surveys, and other modes of gathering feedback.
Earlier this year, the RM put out requests for proposals (RFPs) for the development of the One Community Vision plan and the Recreation, Parks and Culture master plan. Council awarded the contract to both Scatliff, Miller, Murray and RC Strategies, which will work in collaboration collecting feedback, developing reports, and making recommendations to council on both plans.
With a municipal election coming up this fall, CAO Shane Ray says both plans will act as long-term roadmaps to guide council going forward.
The two plans, he says, will achieve different goals.
“The community vision plan is really about determining what are our [municipality’s] values,” says Ray. “It’s about going to the residents and saying, ‘What kind of community do you want to live in?’”
The purpose of the plan, according to the RFP, is to “understand the community’s core values, priorities, and desired future, and to translate these into clear guiding principles and an articulated community vision for the type of place residents want to live, work, and play.”
The recreation master plan will give the RM direction on effectively managing their parks, outdoor spaces, facilities, programs, services and events with regards to recreation, and culture.
This is the RM’s first time creating a community vision plan. The last recreation master plan was adopted by council in 2019. Generally speaking, the plans should look at the community’s needs over the next ten years.
“If you look back at the last recreation master plan, we managed to complete a lot of it in a shorter timeframe,” Ray says. “People like to put a deadline on a plan… but you’re constantly evaluating your plan and making adjustments to it, so it’s possible it may take longer than ten years.”
Ray says it’ll be interesting to create a single community vision master plan from feedback derived from residents of five very unique communities, but in the end he believes that values don’t change that much from one to the next.
“I don’t really see any other communities doing this sort of planning. We’re hoping to be a bit of a leader [in this].”
Ray estimates the cost to create the community vision plan at around $35,000. The recreation master plan will likely be more, but government grants will cut that cost for the municipality in half.