I strongly believe that local leaders have an obligation to leave a legacy. This could be a book, a building, a program that benefits others, or mentoring a young person. It's not enough to be a consumer in this life. We must be producers and contribute to more than our own survival.

When you take the time to articulate your legacy, you put that wish out to the universe, and the universe conspires to bring it to life. Some might reference the law of attraction here, which I think is appropriate.

The key is you have to articulate. Vision boards are a thing for a reason. They physically bring you closer to your vision. You write or cut our pictures of what you want. How you feel when you might achieve it, etc.
But what about a legacy board, what would that look like?

While a vision board is what you want for your life in the future, a legacy board is what you want the impact of your life to be. Do you know the difference? Can you articulate that difference?

Take the time to think about this. If you need help brainstorming through that process, set up a virtual meeting with me.

- Adria

I can't tell you how many times I've seen surveys that ask for the same kinds of information. One month it's for Agency ABC, the next month it's for Agency XYZ, and so on. Often times this could be avoided if people made their data available to the public, or a centralized agency was in charge of collecting this information for use by all agencies and private organizations seeking grant funds or crafting interventions, etc.

Census Data is a great example of this. It's accessible to everyone. However, Census data is outdated after a few years. So what's the solution?

Here is my proposal: Collate information and make it available on a state website with particular agencies responsible for updating that information each year for their particular sphere of influence: healthcare, crime, education, transportation, etc in their geographic radius based in census tracts so it can be over-laid with other kinds of data. This way the entire state is covered and everyone is using the same data, not slightly different versions of data gathered from slightly different questions or slightly different geographic measurements.

Data is a powerful tool, but it is being misused and communities are being over-taxed in some cases to provide answers to things they may have responded to already.

We can create a more coordinated data collection system. If you need help with this, let's talk.

What is the point in being great if no one knows about it?

What if the NFL, NBA, WNBA, MLB and all the other sports organizations played their games out of the public eye and simply declared a winner at the end? It would be the end of sports as we know it. Sports is for spectators! The same is true for community development. We are doing it for the people.

Because community development is a public activity, we must celebrate our successes for a few reasons: 1) public acknowledgment 2) public celebration 3) to have a public record that tracks our progress over time and lastly, 4) to shut down the haters. Just imagine is we kept stats on municipal activity the way they do in sports?

Ways you can advertise your success:
- Send an email to your list
- Include a special flyer to residents in their water bill or other municipal mail
- Post on Social Media
- Hang a banner outside your municipal building
- Create a 20 second commercial (videos are shared more often than text)
- Send out a press release

For more ideas, contact me.