Community Foundation of Western North Carolina

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MLI Pilot Project Unites Citizens in Seven Westermost Counties to Envision the Region's Future

Backed by more than two years of research and planning, The Community Foundation’s Mountain Landscapes Initiative is officially underway. Its long-range goal is an ambitious one: to facilitate an inclusive discussion that leads to practical approaches to managing growth in the 18-county mountain region.

“Studies of needs in our region suggest strong connections with land-use planning, and many of our community partners have told us it’s No. 1 on their list of concerns,” says Foundation President Pat Smith, “so we are making a significant commitment of people, time and funding resources to this initiative.”

A pilot project is already underway in the seven westernmost counties– Haywood, Swain, Jackson, Macon, Clay, Cherokee and Graham – with the help and oversight of the Southwestern Commission, a regional council representing the area. To get the effort started, the Foundation awarded $100,000 – the largest discretionary grant in its history – to the pilot project, which will, in part, create a “Tool Box” of best planning and building practices. Bill Gibson, the Southwestern Commission’s executive director, has called the effort “the most important thing we’ve ever done.”

Already, the initiative has gained regional media attention. In a Jan. 23 editorial, The Franklin Press states “The Mountain Landscapes Initiative puts us on a fast track to coming to grip with some of the most emotional, complicated, and important issues of our time.” The Asheville Citizen-Times wrote, in a Feb. 12 editorial about the initiative, “A new project promises to be the most fruitful effort yet to bring developers, government leaders, landowners and other interests together to collaborate on the best way to encourage growth that preserves the qualities that are driving it.”

To succeed, the effort depends on partners such as the Southwestern Commission because it relies on broad-based and thorough public input. The pilot project seeks to bring together community leaders and residents to strengthen mountain communities and improve the region’s quality of life, which has been the Foundation’s mission since its inception in 1978.

Residents and governmental representatives from each of the seven counties and the Qualla Boundary are already involved on a steering committee to guide the process. Susan Jenkins, executive director of the Cherokee Preservation Foundation, called the initiative “an unusual opportunity for the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Indian Tribe and the Western North Carolina region to better understand and seek the balance of economic growth without losing our way of life, the beauty of the region, or our culture.”

Outreach Director Gabriel Cumming is also conducting in-person and focus-group interviews across the seven counties in the pilot project, which will be included in a short video documentary about the concerns and hopes of citizens and leaders across the region.

The issues residents raise in the interview and outreach process will also help set the agenda for a spring “charette,” an intensive, multiday public workshop that will produce the “Tool Box.” A team of specialists will manage the charette and model specific local projects and approaches for typical development challenges across the region. The “Tool Box” is scheduled to be released this summer.

“This is an exciting opportunity,” said Vicki Greene, director of planning and development services at the Southwestern Commission and project manager of the pilot project. “I feel as if we’ve been preparing for this for years,” she says. “Finally, the time is right.”

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