Partners in Place

Community Open Space Partnership

Statewide Summit, October 2001, and Three Regional Forums, September-November 2002

The Urban Open Space Foundation, the founding partner of COSP and continuing lead partner, contracted with me to coach the design team of sponsoring partners, create the agenda and supporting materials, and train small group facilitators. I also acted as lead facilitator for a statewide Summit and three follow-up regional forums. The major result of the Summit was the launching of COSP as a new partnership. The primary outcome of the Forums was regional input to a statewide policy agenda, Green Infrastructure for Tomorrow (G.I.F.T.) at ouropenspaces.org.

Related materials:

• Participants in facilitated groups used a gradient of agreement to evaluate and improve detailed Working Principles. These princples will guide the new Community Open Space Partnership launched at the Summit.
• Participants in facilitated groups at the regional forums applied five elements of green infrastructure (PDF) to map current community assets and potential new ones.