Public participation is an important and necessary part of any successful comprehensive planning effort. Town residents, community organizations and local stakeholders are a valuable source for information on the issues and opportunities that exist in the Town. The Project Team alone cannot make decisions on how your Town should grow, how resources should be managed and what is important for the future of Cheektowaga. We rely on the insights of local residents and others in the community to provide the information and direction required for developing recommendations for future actions. Therefore, public participation is a key means of defining the desired vision and identity for the Town of Cheektowaga.
Public participation is an ongoing and integral part of this project and is essential for building support for the Plan. A variety of techniques will be employed during the course of this effort to gather input from the public. These include a public outreach meeting, meetings with stakeholder groups, outreach with neighboring communities, a public focus meeting, design charrettes, and a public hearing.
Throughout the planning process, this website also provides a means of informing the public and gathering comments.
You can also provide comments to the Project Team by using the email address provided on the contact information page. Please use 'Cheektowaga Plan" as the email subject.
The Town held a Public Focus Meeting on December 10, 2008 at the Hospice Center to continue discussions on the planning process for the Comprehensive Plan. The purpose of this meeting was to focus on areas of importance and to confirm what was heard at previous meetings on the vision for the future of the community.
This meeting was the second opportunity for the public to provide input for the Plan and to confirm ideas for the Town. Areas of discussion at the meeting were centered around the draft goals and objectives
(see link on this website) and included:
- Identity -- Defining a clear Image, identity and vision for the Town of Cheektowaga
- Revitalization -- Promoting and assisting neighborhood redevelopment and renewal
- Leadership -- Acknowledging and strengthening the regional importance of the Town
- Creativity -- Using creative techniques to achieve the goals and objectives of the comprehensive plan
- Cooperation/Coordination -- Achieving fiscal efficiency within local, regional and State government
- Quality -- Providing quality services and facilities to residents and businesses in the Town
- Mobility -- Improving the transportation system
- Prosperity -- Providing conditions for economic growth and a balanced tax base
A large part of the meeting was focused on an interactive public survey using instant response technology to measure the opinions of the meeting participants on the goals and objectives (highlighted above) and neighborhoods in the Town. The survey response data is provided as follows.
Survey Results (Click here)
Since listening to the community is a very important part of the planning process, comments from this and other meetings will be used to finalize the goals and objectives for the Comprehensive Plan. Additional public meetings will be held in the coming months to allow for comment on the findings and recommendations. There will also be a presentation and public hearing after the Comprehensive Plan is drafted and presented to the Town Board for acceptance. We encourage you to continue to monitor this website for updates and information on future meetings. Comments can also be provided using our email address at cheektowagaplan@wd-ae.com.
A Public Design Workshop was held on September 3, 2009. This meeting
offered an opportunity for the public to provide the project team with their
reaction to the initial recommendations for the Town’s future. The opening
presentation for the Design Workshop included an interactive survey, using
audience “clickers” to gather opinions on specific topics.
The Town of Cheektowaga Comprehensive Plan concentrates on the following major
topic areas, and there were brief presentations on the status of the work done
to date on these elements:
- Transportation
- Economic Development (jobs and businesses)
- Neighborhood Revitalization
- Land Use and Zoning
The meeting also included smaller, hands-on workshop sessions, where
participants could provide input on the various aspects of the plan, such as
Envisioning the Future, Getting Around Town, and Spending Time / Spending Money.
Getting Around Town – this session focused on transportation issues of
mobility and access. How do you get to where you are going? What changes to the
current transportation system are needed? Where? Can we encourage more people to
get out of their cars and walk to their destinations? Do you support
recreational trails? What about transit? Would you support a dedicated transit
line from the airport to downtown through Cheektowaga?
Envision the Future – this session addressed proposed new designs for the
three focus areas and allowed participants to provide input on how these areas
and other parts of the Town could look in the future:
- Walden-Harlem area redesigned to be more pedestrian friendly, with a future
transit station
- Genesee-Union area redesigned as a small town center, where Airport Plaza is
the “Main Street” for the surrounding residential areas
- French Road corridor redesigned to improve aesthetics, address vacant
commercial properties and be more bike-friendly.
Spending Time/ Spending Money – this session looked at opportunities for
economic development and job growth in the Town. How do we encourage a better
positive image for Cheektowaga? Do your daily activities support local
businesses? What type of business growth should we target? What changes can we
make to improve the Town’s future?
The public was also offered the opportunity to take the Visual Preference
Survey. The evening concluded with a summary in the auditorium allow for
additional comments and questions and to review next steps in the planning
process.
Handouts and PowerPoint presentation from the Public Design Workshop are available for download below.