Introducing the Flint Hills Frontiers Community Toolbox - Starter. This is a chance for you to gather your friends, your neighbors, your community, for a conversation on the future of the Flint Hills. It's your chance to contribute to the Frontiers Regional Plan and it starts right here. Just download the Starter Kit, gather a small group or your local community and follow the included instructions. What results, will inform the Frontiers Regional Plan and help builder a brighter future for all that love the Flint Hills. If your group has questions about hosting an event, just contact us, at community@flinthillsregion.org.

Starter Kit

April and the start of spring, led Frontiers staff to visioning meetings throughout the 19 counties of the Flint Hills. Meetings began in Ark City and ended in Emporia. The month brought hundreds of new people to the project and through variable turnout and inclement weather, these meetings serve as the cornerstone of the Frontiers vision for the future of the Flint Hills.  Visioning meetings continue into early May and those that can’t make it to a public meeting are encouraged to visit our Forum.flinthillsfrontiers.org website, and offer their vision for the Future of the Flint Hills.

Below, you’ll find a word-cloud from all of the visioning meetings, showing a weighted-impression of what is on the minds of citizens as they think about the future of the Flint Hills.

The Frontiers project held a Technical Experts meeting of regional planning, zoning, GIS and development professionals in Matfield Green’s Pioneer Bluffs Prairie Heritage Education Center and Gallery. This unique facility, deep in the heart of the Flint Hills, is a great example of the hidden gems that come to define this region. Just around every corner lies something unexpected and the same can be said of the rich resources of professional talent dedicated to maintaining the rich heritage of the Flint Hills. The Technical Experts were given an overview and timeline for the project and introduced to the project’s planning team, some of the tools being developed towards furthering regional collaboration and coordination.

Project Manager, Jeff Adams, traveled to Salt Lake City, to present the latest developments of the Frontiers project at the Prosperous Places conference, co-hosted by Envision Utah and the National Association of Development Organizations (NADO). The conference focused on building economic competitiveness in rural regions and smaller places. A direct result from the connections made at the conference brings a capacity building opportunity to our Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy work, on behalf of NADO.

Erik Pages, from Entreworks, LLC, out of Arlington, VA, will be lending his technical assistance to the Flint Hills Economic Development District formation. Erik will attend the FHEDD Citizen Strategy Committee meeting, May 22nd and the Flint Hills Regional Council meeting on Friday, May 24th, to meet with regional economic interests and provide his expertise on the strategies being developed by the central Flint Hills area.

The community is encouraged to checkout the Flint Hills Frontiers Community Toolbox - Starter Kit, now available at the website. The Starter Kit is a unique way for clubs, civic groups, schools, book clubs or communities to engage in the Frontiers project. Each Toolbox comes with detailed instructions on holding and facilitating a meeting and we are always happy to help.

Another view of the stakeholder kickoff meeting. The larger the word in this wordcloud, the more often it was discussed.

(credit: wordle.net)

The Stakeholder Kickoff meeting occurred November 27th at the Sunset Zoo in Manhattan. Read or download the notes below.

Download pdf.