Engagement Plan Overview
Goals of Community Engagement
The goal of the General Plan is to build a framework for maintaining and enhancing Ventura’s quality of life. This includes a balance of living, working, and shopping in Ventura. To achieve this goal, we committed to:
Inspiring the community to share ideas in guiding Ventura’s future
Empowering the public in supporting timely decisions
Enhancing two-way engagement with the public, stakeholders, commissions, and council
Ensuring clear and consistent messaging across the city
Delivering community-valued results
Engagement Activities
The City hosted many events and activities to engage Ventura residents and stakeholders. These activities were designed to allow the public to participate in a way that is easy, user friendly, and accessible to everyone. Some of the key activities that occurred throughout the process are:
Project website with information and updates
Safe, in-person and virtual public workshops and open houses, for citywide topics and individual neighborhoods
Educational videos and events with guest speakers on specific topics of interest
Community surveys
Development of a General Plan Advisory Committee to help guide the process
City Council, board and commission study sessions to share what the future could look like and gather feedback from decision-makers
How did we reach residents?
One of the greatest challenges of community engagement is reaching residents who aren’t typically engaged in city planning efforts. To reach as many residents as possible, the City of Venture completed the following activities::
Ensured that materials were bilingualfor our residents who are not fluent in English and use guidelines from the California Web Accessibility standards for ADA compliance.
Leveraged digital communications channels to inform our residents throughout the process such as social media, electronic newsletters, and website.
Partnered with community groups including churches, community councils and not-for profit organizations to increase engagement and build relationships
Attended meetings and public events and community events, either virtually or in-person to encourage participation.
Distributed printed materials such as flyers, surveys and fact sheets to organizations serving different segments of the community at key locations such as food banks, supermarkets, unemployment offices and coffee shops.
