Walters State Community College Morristown
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Tennessee Map Lakeway Region Hamblen County Morristown, TN Morristown - Hamblen County Community Profile Initiative P.O. Box 9 825 West First North Street Morristown, Tennessee 37815 Phone: 423-586-6382 Fax: 423-586-6576 www.morristownchamber.com Message from the Steering Committee he Morristown - Hamblen County Community incere appreciation goes to Project Consultant, Dr. Profile Steering Committee sincerely thanks Irene Jillson; Project Manager, Lisa Gilliam; and theT many volunteers who spent countless hours graphicS designer, Gordan Graham for their efforts on working on this Profile of our community. We are behalf of the Profile team. especially grateful to the project’s major sponsors, Alcoa Foundation and Jefferson Federal Charitable t is the Steering Committee’s heartfelt wish that Foundation, and our strategic and participating Ithis Community Profile will be used as a tool and a partners: Morristown Area Chamber of Commerce, foundation to move this community forward thereby Lakeway Regional Hospital, Tennessee Technology improving the quality of life for every citizen of Center at Morristown, Hamblen County P-16 Council, Morristown and Hamblen County. Lakeway Publishers, Inc., Douglas Cherokee Economic Authority, City of Morristown, Hamblen County Government and Walters State Community College. i INTRODUCTION The 2008-2009 Morristown Area Chamber of Commerce partners; Lakeway Publishers, Inc., Morristown Area Chamber Chairs Alex Rom-Roginski and Lynn Elkins and their appointed of Commerce, Tennessee Technology Center, Lakeway Regional Steering Committee including the 2010 and 2011 MACC Chairs Hospital, Hamblen County P-16 Council, Douglas Cherokee are proud to present the 2010 Morristown - Hamblen County Economic Authority, Hamblen County Government, City of Community Profile. We describe the region through narrative Morristown and Walters State Community College. explanations and accompanying statistics, hoping to present a well-rounded picture depicting areas of both pride and concern The Steering Committee then created a plan to develop an in our community, as well as perception of how the quality of evolving and sustainable process to identify and evaluate life has evolved over time. our community’s demographic and socio-economic state and produce a report to project preferred targets and engage the WHAT IS THE QUALITY OF LIFE / COMMUNITY community in generating strategic actions for ensuring our PROFILE? economic success and improved well being. The Steering This year marks the first time that a Quality of Life Profile has Committee selected ten areas of focus: Arts, Culture, and been compiled for Morristown - Hamblen County. This type Recreation; Business and Economic Development; Education; of report is an approach to considering local conditions – the Environment; Health; Housing; Physical Infrastruture; Public economy, education, the environment, arts and culture, crime, Safety; Social Services; and Transportation, initially identifying health care, among others – and comparing these to conditions in a chair for each. They then collaborated with committee chairs the state and in the country overall. Quality of Life profiles, or in selecting individuals to serve as members of the committees. indices, are increasingly used by countries throughout the world and by states and cities in the U.S. Essentially, through these The process entailed broad-based participation on the part reports, the communities are expressing their values, presenting of more than one hundred and fifty individuals who spent clearly what is important to their communities futures. The approximately twelve hundred hours creating an evolving profile provides local leaders with a shared base of knowledge and sustainable process that identified our community’s from available data and information to address the community’s socio - economic status and 2015-2020 preferred targets. The current and future opportunities and challenges. participatory process was comprised of two parts: VISION AND MISSION OF THIS PROJECT 1) creating the profile, including identifying benchmarks and The vision of the Morristown - Hamblen County Community indicators to be achieved by 2015 and 2020; and Profile Initiative was 2) developing strategies and plans to achieve the proposed to develop an evolving and sustainable process to identify indicators. and evaluate demographic and socio-economic conditions, project preferred targets, and generate strategic actions This report presents the first part of that process – the current for ensuring the continued economic success and improved status and projected targets for key sectors in our community. well being of Morristown and Hamblen County. The focus area committees met for more than eight hundred The mission of the Initiative is to create an evolving roadmap hours to identify benchmarks, provide necessary current and to achieve economic success and to improve the well being of past trend data, select priorities among the benchmarks, and Morristown and Hamblen County through visionary leadership decide what they believe should be the indicators in 2015 via diverse partnerships, strategic planning, credible data and and 2020. Where possible, they considered the indicators in resources, broad-based community involvement, sustainable comparison with state and national data. In some cases, current process, respectful and responsible procedures, commitment to data for Hamblen County and Morristown were not available improvement, and consensus development. for the priority indicators, but the committees determined that it would be important to collect the data in the future so that the The Process information could be used in the planning process. The Steering In January 2008, Chamber of Commerce Chairs Alex Rom- Committee reviewed benchmarks and indicators, considering the Roginski and Lynn Elkins joined efforts to create a two-year linkages among them, and worked with the committees to select broad-based special initiative to address the community’s current the final priorities for Hamblen County’s and Morristown’s and future opportunities and challenges. They appointed a Vice- quality of life measures. The report presents these priorities by Chair and formed an initiative Steering Committee consisting of telling the story of our community and its goals for the best of all Hamblen County Mayor David Purkey; Morristown Mayor Sami possible futures. Barile; Chamber Chairs Alex Rom-Roginski; Lynn Elkins; Mike Davidson; Blaine Potter; Industrial Board Chair Jack Fishman; Following dissemination of this report, the Chamber and its Chamber President Thom Robinson; Initiative Vice-Chair Tish partners will engage the community further to identify and Jones; and Chamber General Manager Debra Williams. consider strategies and agree on a way to assess progress on a periodic basis. We will also plan for ways to continue to review The Steering Committee identified and successfully solicited the the quality of life of our community, taking into account and Alcoa Foundation and Jefferson Federal Charitable Foundation addressing both internal and external changes that impact our as major sponsors as well as nine strategic and supporting quality of life. ii 5 NEXT STEPS periods. During this phase, committees may be altered to meet We hope that the 2010 Morristown - Hamblen Community the needs of the engagement process, which will be expanded Profile will serve as a tool for discussion and planning. In the to include as many members of our Morristown - Hamblen next phase of the process, the Steering Committee will use County community as possible. We encourage all citizens of our this report as the basis for widespread community engagement community to participate in this process to determine the future regarding the benchmarks for 2015 and 2020, and to develop of Morristown - Hamblen County. strategies to achieve the priority benchmarks for these time 5 1iii EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Idea The Process In 2008, Morristown Area Chamber of Commerce Chair Alex Broad-based participation on the part of more than one hundred Rom-Roginski and Chair-elect Lynn Elkins collaborated to and fifty individuals, who spent approximately two thousand create an initiative to address current and future opportunities hours, created an evolving and sustainable process that identified and challenges for Morristown - Hamblen County, Tennessee. our community’s socio - economic status and target goals for The goal was to review quality of life measurements within the 2015 and 2020. This process will generate strategic actions for community and compare them to similar measures in other cities, ensuring the economic success and improved well being of the towns and counties in the U.S. and other countries. citizens of Morristown - Hamblen County. The project received grants from two major sponsors, Alcoa Foundation and Jefferson The intent of these planning processes was to identify those Federal Charitable Foundation as well as financial, in-kind and aspects of the community that are important to its citizens, to other support from our strategic and participating partners. The select goals, or benchmarks for each of these areas, to identify participatory process was comprised of two parts: the improvements that need to be made to ensure the best quality of life for all members of the community, and to describe 1) creating the profile, including identifying benchmarks and potential action steps to reach their quality of life goals. For indicators to be achieved by