The recording can speak for itself, however I have a couple observations.
All of the water districts here today are groundwater operations relying upon non-renewable water supplies. The water districts operate independently from each other, and independent from county government oversight.
Commissioner Schlegel’s vision is to get them all to agree on an Elbert County water master plan so that future water infrastructure development will build out within a network designed to eventually support commercial economic growth from renewable water sources.
This is a laudable goal – an “if you build it they will come” approach that will incentivize market makers to come here and create infrastructure to benefit everyone. Lest the contrast be lost on the Prairie-Plains-oriented, this vision stands in stark contrast to their deterministic, scarcity-spells-doom, fear-infused, closed off vision of the future.
Apparently, Elbert County Commissioners will lead off the water planning effort by producing an Elbert County planning vision statement next week – not sure if this is a general planning vision or just a water planning statement.
My metric for assessing whether planning statements can succeed depends on if they anticipate and foster local job markets for all of the working age population who live in Elbert County. We are too remote to succeed as a horsey bedroom community.
Elbert County needs to offer a vision to water districts, developers, commercial investors, and to all of its neighbors, of a viable economic entity worth their support because they can potentially make a return on their investment here. We must attract capital, not chase it away by obsessing like Democrats on how to tax it.
To put it objectively – what vision would reasonable people standing outside of the county consider an attractive investment? That vision would have to include a job market that supports its population. A charity case with high unemployment won’t sell.
From that first principle you can deductively back into the rest of the plan.