In an era of increasing complexity, the majority of local land-use decisions in the United States are made by volunteer citizen planners. Often these elected or appointed volunteers enter their positions with a passion for their communities but without appropriate background training. The Michigan Citizen Planner Program was developed to address…

A survey of over 200 residents of a largely Hispanic census tract in Perth Amboy, NJ found that residents preferred recreation, cultural, and other community facilities be the aim of brownfield re-development. They were less interested in industry and business, the promoted aim of such re-development. Three-quarters of respondents indicated a…

As part of a statewide study of public opinion, "Illinois: Today and Tomorrow," questionnaires were distributed to a sample of Illinois residents to determine their perceptions of land use, planning, and zoning. Respondents were asked whether more, the same amount, or less land should be allocated to specific uses (homes, recreation,…

Contained in this final report of a one-day conference are abstracts of speakers' remarks, conference conclusions and evaluation, appendices on publicity, conference handouts, goal statements, and sample lessons for citizen education. The purpose of the conference was to provide dialogue among practitioners of citizen participation skills,…

Information and data were obtained from personal interviews with 93 local officials and 344 community leaders in 8 rural areas of Virginia in 1977 to assess the capacity building needs of rural areas brought on both by internal demands of local citizens for improvements in community assistance and services, and demands placed on local communities…

Land use controls are often a major point of conflict between recent migrants and long-term residents of rapidly growing communities. Such conflict was noted in a case study of a rural community undergoing rapid population growth. The revision of a comprehensive land use plan for the community provided the opportunity to evaluate citizen…

A citizen-based, long-range goal-setting program for future growth and development is documented in this report. The program spanned over two years in time, involved over 1,100 local citizens, and produced goals and policy guidelines for both the short- and long-range future of the city. The components of the process consisted of staff and support…

This publication reports the development of the vocational-technical resource consortia in Ohio and identifies the operational procedures associated with successful programs. Five exemplary consortia were studied in some depth; however, data were obtained from all of the 23 consortia in the state. The research indicates that the consortium is an…