Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, August 13, 1993 TAG: 9308130153
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B3 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: DANIEL HOWES STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
\ Thomas Robertson is learning that consensus-building sometimes knows no schedule.
Last month, Robertson - president of Carilion Health System and chairman of the Roanoke Valley Business Council - predicted the strategic economic vision process he's trying to organize would get moving by mid-July.
Robertson and a group of other community leaders think the Roanoke and New River valleys need to look for common ground as they face the economic contractions wrought by the changing global economy.
But it wasn't until Wednesday that Robertson and Tech President James McComas appointed themselves co-chairs for the effort and chose a name: The New Century Council - A Vision for Western Virginia. They also decided to hire a Jacksonville, Fla., consultant who helps communities craft visions for themselves.
Henry Luke, the principal in Luke Planning Inc., soon will begin interviewing community leaders in the Roanoke and New River valleys in an effort to assess the region's strengths and weaknesses.
Luke, reached at his Jacksonville office, declined to talk about what he'll be doing for the Business Council-Tech effort. He promised to meet with reporters later this month.
Darrell Martin, a special assistant to McComas and key Tech liaison to the vision process, hailed Luke's experience with similar efforts in Atlanta and Jacksonville. Luke is helping Hampton Roads localities develop an economic development consensus as they confront defense spending cutbacks.
"He doesn't come in and provide all the answers," Martin said, "but he is a catalyst for producing answers. His primary role is to facilitate consensus within the region, a consensus of where we're going and where we'll be."
Two years ago Luke helped the Metropolitan Richmond Chamber of Commerce draft its community vision for the city and three neigboring counties. The reviews were mixed:
"He has a unique ability to help a community look at itself and sort things out and decide what options it might want to consider," James W. Dunn, president of the Richmond chamber, has said of Luke's efforts.
John Accordino, an urban policy analyst at Virginia Commonwealth University, has said Richmond's visions process "did some things real well." But he faulted Richmond's process for not doing a good job of involving elected officials.
Consequently, he said in a recent interview, Richmond's plan was simply handed to elected officials, who, because they weren't a part of its formation, tended to ignore it as just another study.
"It had a push and then died," he said.
Vision processes aren't new to regions struggling to find their niche in a changing world. To succeed, Accordino said, they need support from elected officials, choices for the community and study of specific problems: "If Roanoke had done this 10 to 15 years ago, you might have said, `OK what happens to us if the railroad leaves, if the bank leaves?' "
Robertson and a handful of key planners already have decided against making the region's elected officials full participants in the process - much to the dismay of Roanoke Mayor David Bowers. Bowers has called for a coalition between business and political leaders concerned with the region's future.
Luke was chosen from a list of four finalists considered by Robertson and a panel drawn from Tech, the Business Council and several area chambers of commerce. In June, the Business Council - the chief executive officers of the valley's 50 largest employers - sought and received the participation of nine area chambers, each of which appointed two members to a vision steering committee.
A comprehensive list of the participants still has not been made public, despite repeated requests of Robertson and other planners. Thursday, Robertson agreed to release the names, but had not done so by the end of the business day.
Still, Robertson and other planners say they intend to conduct their vision "summit" - tentatively rescheduled from Sept. 14-15 to mid-October at Mountain Lake Hotel in Giles County - in open meetings, allowing complete media coverage.
A guest list for the meeting still is being devised, making sure key constituencies from both valleys are properly represented. "We just can't afford to make a mistake on it," Robertson said. "We want it to be inclusive, and we want there to be some buy-in when we're finished."
Details of the process and retreat remain sketchy. Robertson said Luke's interviews of community leaders likely will culminate with the October summit and an "assessment of where we are."
The meetings likely will include reports on economic development and demographic projections, Martin said, as well as a "state of the valleys" assessment.
Some skepticism remains. "I think people are guarded in their outlook and want to see what's going to come out of it," Robertson said, "particularly in the New River Valley, where they want to see it's not dominated by Roanokers, that it's indeed a regional effort."
Memo: shorter version ran in the Metro edition.