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Lake Chelan Community Open Space Vision

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What is a Community Open Space Vision?

The Lake Chelan Community Open Space Vision will be a comprehensive community-based vision for balancing strategic protection of open space and recreation with continued local development. It will help local communities make informed decisions about protecting important resources, including open spaces, water quality, and recreational opportunities.

Stakeholders will work toward common goals using facilitated community meetings, strategic outreach, and state-of-the-art GIS mapping and modeling. The goal of the process is to create a win-win-win between land uses that are often competing by bringing many as many voices as possible into the conversation, employing the best technology available, and taking steps to ensure that implementation is effective. Through this process, we will:

• Determine the top open space and recreation priorities for local community members, including seasonal community members.
• Engage locals in a community-based process to determine how to best protect the natural and recreational resources of the Lake Chelan area.
• Work with stakeholders representing diverse interests to combine local knowledge with scientific data to create compelling maps of local conservation priorities.
• Work with partners to foster community support for protecting local recreational resources and open space.

The Lake Chelan Community Open Space Vision will highlight areas for strategic voluntary protection and thoughtful recreation access. The Vision partners respect private property rights.  We recognize the critical importance of working lands and their stewardship by ranchers and farmers who are deeply committed to maintaining the unique environment and rural culture of the Lake Chelan area. Any future recreation access would be based on collaboration with and respect for landowners.

How can I get involved?

You can get involved by participating in our community survey (www.surveymonkey.com/r/Chelan) by September 28, 2016. Everyone who responds to the survey is eligible to win $100 in “Lake Chelan Bucks.” We would also love to have you attend our stakeholder meetings to share your views. The first stakeholder meeting will be October 5, 5:30 to 7:30 pm in the city council chambers (135 E Johnson Ave, Chelan). If you’d like to make sure that you are notified about our meetings, please contact Amy Morris ([email protected]).

Questions? Please contact Amy Morris at The Trust for Public Land ([email protected]); Karen Sargeant from the City of Chelan ([email protected]); or Guy Evans of the Lake Chelan Trails Alliance ([email protected]).