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PLANNING FOR MINNESOTA'S FUTURE Checking Your City's Vision Having a clear vision helps us work more effectively, reduces fatigue, prevents us from missing new opportunities, and keeps us out of harm's way. But vision can also refer to a dream or ideal that shapes our actions and decisions. By W. Arthur Mehrhoff, Ph.D. ow more than ever, cities have to think, plan, and act on their futures or they will be left behind in the new era of global competition. Despite the enormous demogaphic, economic, and cultural waves' of change wast~ing over cities--re- placing manufacturing with know- ledge and service industries as the economic base of cities--there still remains a place for good places in modern society. In fact, such places may become even more precious in the midst of such rapid change, as the global village be- comes a globe of villages and qual- it'/of life becomes more thanjust a slogan. Since quality of life is important to individuals, businesses, and cit- ies, cities must learn to understand and value their own unique char- actefistics and to chart their own courses on the rolling seas of post- industrialization. Russell Ackoff of the Wharton School of Business suggests the only kind of stability in such a complex, unpredictable, and interconnected environment is similar to that of an airplane flying in a storm. Like Chares Lindbergh carefully navigating the Spirit of Saint Louis across the Adantic, cit- les need to achieve this precarious balance through discipline and a thorough understanding of their systems, tools, and the forces acting upon them, along with a clear sense of direction. A vision state- ment becomes a city's flight plan for its chosen future and its image of how to integate themany roles and functions of citizens into a purposeful system--making the flight as rewarding as possible for everyone on board. Visioning has several advantages not found in the typical city plan- ning process. Visioning addresses a wider range of civic concerns and groups. It identifies strategic trends 'and forces, seeks a clear under- ' standing of community values, and offers a big picture to guide imme- diate decisions. The process also creates the appropriate tools and techniques for implementing the vision. Visioning assumes that citi- zens have both the ability and the responsibility for shaping their own futures. Cities as diverse as Litde Falls, Minn., Chattanooga, Tenn., and Pordand, Ore., have discovered that the visioning process releases enormous civic energ3' and cre- ative forces. In fact, one of the ba- sic ideas of visioning is that due to the rapid flow of data, ideas, and capital characterizing post-indus- trial society, city government no longer has a monopoly on those re- sources. The more complex the system, the more insights and in- volvement fi'om different levels are needed to make the system work. One practical consideration, there- fore, is making sure citizens are in- volved in the visioning process. Since each city has different char- actenstics, it is important to use existing institutions like churches "V~sioning addresses a wider range of civic concerns and groups, it iden~es strategic trends and forces, seeks a dear understanding of community values, and offers a big picture to guide immediate decisions." OCTOS~P. 1997 MINNESOTA C~T~S 11