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Show Task force readies Park City's bid for All-America judging in Cincinnati Nov. 1 7 by JANICE PERRY Record editor With little more than three weeks before Park City must make a presentation to the' All-America Cities award jury, officials and citizens today held the first meeting of a special task force whose charge is to put the city's best foot forward. Park City is one of 20 finalists in the 35-year-old competition for the All-America Cities award, an honor given to a handful of communities annually by the Citizens Forum on Self-Government of the National Municipal League. The 91-year-old organization awards the honors to cities that demonstrate ingenuity and independence in-dependence in identifying and solving solv-ing local problems. Park City's improvements im-provements in education, its cleanup of the Prospector Square tailings and its hosting of the International Winter Special Olympics Games were cited by the league as reasons for its selection as a finalist. But Park City has weathered only the first of the league's three-step selection process, said league assistant assis-tant director Bill Anderson, who said this year about 500 cities showed interest in-terest in the award. Of those, he said, 93 submitted formal applications. "There was a pretty rigorous self-screening self-screening process, as many of the cities probably realized their stories were not complete enough," he said. The next step is a formal, 10-minute presentation by the city before the league jury in Cincinnati Nov. 17, Anderson said. "That would be a more in-depth look at a particular par-ticular aspect of their story." The third, final step in the select tion process is what Anderson called "an actual field visit, usually done unannounced during December or ' the end of January." That inspection team will "check to see if what they read and heard is happening in a community is in fact occurring," he said. In the spring, the winners will be named and historically about half the finalists have been so honored, he said. With little time to prepare for the November presentation, a brainstorming brainstor-ming session was held last weekend among Park City Manager Arlehe Loble, Park City Chamber of CommerceConvention Com-merceConvention & Visitors Bureau Director Bill Clinger and several others. After that meeting, a dozen or so invitations were sent to community leaders, asking them to participate in the task force at its organizational meeting today, Oct. 24. The Park City Ci-ty Council last week passed a resolution resolu-tion asking former councilwoman Tina Lewis to act as chairman of the committee. She declined. Anderson said he was most impressed im-pressed with the planning aspect of Park City's application. "One of the things that struck the , evaluators and me, personally, as well was the sensitivity of Park City Ci-ty in trying to accommodate new growth and yet still appreciate what was in the past and accommodate both of those needs. That's what was ' attractive." He said the evaluators were impressed im-pressed with the city's explanation of how a small town tried to meet the needs of population that has largely come from larger, more cosmopolitan areas, while still protecting pro-tecting Park City's "historic, Old-Town Old-Town charm" and meeting thf. needs of tourists. "That illustrates a pretty sophisticated understanding of what goes on in the community," he s?.id. He said in applying for the avard, communities often present only their best faces and hide the town's shortcomings. For instance, he said, a city may tout how it cut unemployment unemploy-ment in half by attracting new business and industry to its area. "That's pretty dramatic," he said. "But maybe in their story they do not say that environmental regulations regula-tions had to be relaxed to attract the industry and that may be detrimental detrimen-tal to the community. Or they do not tell how the new industry attracted so many workers it stressed the school system, causing severe educational problems." Anderson said the jury is not v limited to information provided by the city in making its decision. "That's the reason the evaluation takes us as long as it does," he said. New information further emphasizing emphasiz-ing a community's character also can be introduced, he said. The National Municipal League was founded in 1894 during the Progressive Pro-gressive Era, Anderson said. "Its intent in-tent was to improve the effectiveness, effec-tiveness, efficiency and honesty of local government. "Over the years, those three objectives ob-jectives have been sustained, but the focus has shifted to state and local systems of government, ' ' he said. While the league is strongly interested in-terested in how government can improve im-prove its effectiveness and responsiveness, respon-siveness, the organization also is deeply interested in how community groups affect change. "The league is not only interested in quantitative measures, but also qualitative: 'Who were those people and what did they actually do? Were they cooperative, special-interest groups or were there people out there pulling the strings?'" he said. |
