“Hope is not strategy. Hope fits with vision, but we must have a strategy and a process to make our vision become a reality.” -John C. Maxwell

2020 – 2024 Planning for Continued Success…TOGETHER!

Brentwood Borough staff has been busy this summer preparing to draft its next Five-Year Strategic Plan. Strategic planning is a valuable tool for municipalities of all sizes as a way to plan for future goals and priorities with specific, measurable policy objectives and work plans. Strategic planning also involves completing a deep analysis of the current internal circumstances and external environment facing a municipality as part of the planning process to assist in developing a plan that addresses a municipality’s needs and weaknesses while leveraging its strengths and opportunities to increase quality of life for the residents. A five-year strategic plan is short term enough to be achievable and result in immediate changes, while also being long term enough to encourage looking towards the future of the Borough when making decisions in the present day.

This process has involved reflecting on past strategic plans to see which goals have been accomplished, as well as which goals have been more difficult to complete and why. The most recent strategic plan, for example, led to the hiring of a Parks and Recreation Director, more community wide events, the redevelopment that is currently in progress of the Brentwood Pool and Park and construction of a new Borough administration building that will be completed next year. However, as before, WE NEED YOUR INPUT! This process will once again be inclusive and transparent engaging the Borough’s residents, employees, and Council members. As with past plans, we will again respect and balance community input with the vision of our elected officials. At the conclusion of this process, December 2019, we will have another 5-year plan with achievable Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) but more importantly, another implementation plan to take what is on paper and MAKE IT HAPPEN!

Next steps will involve the COMMUNITY’s INPUT!! A survey will once again be available to Brentwood residents as well as the elected officials to capture data on your current perceptions of Borough services and what they would like to see the Borough focus on in the coming years. The results of this survey will be the starting point for an ALL DAY Council Planning Workshop. The survey can be accessed by clicking on the link from the Borough’s Web Site at https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/brentwoodsurvey and will only take 5-10 minutes of your time.

Some questions to ask yourself prior to beginning the survey are:

What do you hope will be true about Brentwood Borough in 5 years that is not true today?
What are the highest priority things that should be “on the table”/under consideration during the strategic planning process?
What are the most distinctive qualities of Brentwood Borough that should be preserved/should not be changed?
What are the most important goals for Brentwood Borough over the next 5-years?

The Timeline for this project will includes the following:

Phase I: Engagement/Fact Finding - August 2019 – September 2019
Phase II: Objectives and Key Results - October 2019 – November 2019
Phase III: Final Strategic Plan Adoption - December 2019
Phase IV: Implementation/Action Planning - 2020 – 2024

This is an ambitious schedule, as with most of the projects the Borough has successfully undertaken, but with the limited resources available to the Borough it is something that must be completed expeditiously. The strategic planning process is more than simply coming up with a “wish list” of what we would like to see happen in Brentwood. It requires us to make difficult decisions in order to set priorities based on the achievable results that can occur with our limited resources. We will need to listen to everyone and yes that may involve considering someone else’s views that may be totally opposite to our own. However, the end result will most likely consist of a Shared Vision for the future of Brentwood Borough. With everyone then Taking Ownership of that Vision to ensure it becomes a reality. I respectfully ask you all to join us in this process. The success truly depends on our entire community!

Thank you for all of your continued support.