In addition to traditional “bricks and mortar” concerns, municipal leaders throughout the nation are looking beyond physical infrastructure to the policies and practices that support children, youth, and families and build a foundation of strong neighborhoods and cities.
Some local officials, such as Providence, R.I., Mayor David Cicilline, are building citywide systems of high-quality afterschool programs. Others, such as Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper and San Antonio Mayor Phil Hardberger, are expanding access to college through financial aid endowments for local public school students. El Paso, Texas, officials have brought together police and service providers to focus on at-risk youth and maintain a low crime rate. The cities of Spokane, Wash., and Casper, Wyo., have developed strong youth councils that advise city officials on youth concerns. And from Nashville, Tenn., to Somerville, Mass., municipal leaders are combating childhood obesity by promoting healthy eating, exercise and changes to the physical environment that encourage walking and biking.
As the scope and diversity of youth services provided by local governments and their partners expands, city officials are increasingly looking to knit together their efforts into comprehensive plans for child and youth development.
Many are turning to “youth master planning,” a cutting-edge process that brings together key stakeholders – including young people, parents, city government, the school district, businesses, community and faith-based organizations, and others – to set long-term, community-wide priorities for young people and take specific action steps toward those goals. These plans allow city and school leaders to take stock of all the ways they currently serve youth, discover new opportunities, and address pressing needs while continuing to maintain the services and supports that are showing positive results.
Cities such as Charleston, S.C.; Des Moines, Iowa; Diamond Bar, Calif.; Edmond, Okla.; Lakewood, Ohio; and Minneapolis, Minn., have worked to develop youth master plans. Each of these cities participated in the MetLife City-Schools Youth Planning technical assistance initiative sponsored by the National League of Cities’ (NLC) Institute for Youth, Education, and Families (YEF Institute) from 2005-06.
Youth Master Planning
Youth master planning processes offer many benefits to cities, including a better alignment of resources to reduce duplication of services and eliminate service gaps; coordination of city, school, and community efforts to improve outcomes for youth; cost savings; and opportunities for citizen input and youth participation.
For instance, the City of Hampton, Va.’s award-winning Youth Civic Engagement model provides meaningful opportunities for young people to serve others, influence local decision-making, and gain leadership and work experience. The city’s youth receive training to survey their peers and make recommendations to the City Council, serve on city boards and commissions, and participate in the city’s planning department. Input from Hampton youth demonstrating that a youth-focused facility would be under-utilized saved the city over $3 million.
Since the City of Claremont and Claremont Unified School District approved a youth master plan in 1995 in response to demographic change and increased need for children and family services, the community has reduced crime and youth program costs, developed joint use agreements for city and school facilities, and increased program effectiveness. The city and school district jointly fund the Claremont Youth Partnership, a community organization established to promote and monitor implementation of the Claremont Youth Master Plan.
While each city tailors their plan to meet unique local needs, youth master plans typically share many common elements:
* A shared vision articulated by city, school and other community leaders linked to measurable indicators of progress;
* A strong youth voice in shaping and implementing the plan;
* Broad-based collaboration among local government, youth, and other key partners focused on the well-being of young people;
* Assessment of needs, current resources and investments, and emerging opportunities (e.g., some cities use GIS technology to conduct youth mapping projects; these projects can be used to identify the location of youth services, afterschool programs and recreation centers, overlaid with data on crime, truancy, dropout or poverty rates, to determine where services are lacking in each neighborhood);
* A coordinating agency or intermediary organization to facilitate communication, align resources with policies and programs, and monitor implementation.
* Shared accountability through common outcome measures, delegation of responsibility for implementing strategies, a timeline for each action step, and efforts to generate community support for the plan.
* A strategy to institutionalize the plan as a guide for future investments in youth through clear and consistent messages to the media, effective marketing of the plan to residents, ongoing youth engagement in local government, and sustainable funding streams.
NLC to Assist Six Cities in Implementing Youth Plans
As cities develop comprehensive plans for meeting the needs of their children and youth, the YEF Institute at the National League of Cities is providing information and assistance to support these efforts. The YEF Institute recently announced the selection of six cities – Charleston, S.C.; Lakewood, Ohio; Lexington, Ky.; Grand Rapids, Mich.; Portland, Ore.; and Washington, D.C. – to receive technical assistance in the implementation of comprehensive plans for children and youth. The new initiative, made possible through support from the MetLife Foundation, will assist these cities in building collaborations, coordinating systems, and implementing their planned strategies.
Charleston and Lakewood, which participated in a previous YEF Institute project, will share the knowledge they developed through their youth master planning processes with the four other cities participating in the current effort.
Grand Rapids, Lexington and Washington, D.C., will seek to implement plans created in response to various challenges, such as the increased number of youth living in poverty, growing concerns about youth violence and a lack of developmental assets among youth that are essential to their future success. The City of Portland plans to begin implementing its Children and Youth Bill of Rights, based on the belief that all members of a community, including youth, have the right to be engaged in decisions that impact their lives.
These cities were competitively selected from 14 strong applications, and represent communities with a diverse range of plans and demographic compositions. Each of the six cities is well positioned to implement and sustain their planned efforts. In addition to individualized technical assistance, the YEF Institute will structure multiple opportunities for these cities to share information, insights, and strategies for progress with their colleagues, and will broker access to national experts to help each city move forward.
In the coming months, the YEF Institute will publish a new action kit for municipal leaders on youth master planning that will highlight strategies, city examples, and additional resources on this topic. Visit the YEF Institute website or contact Leon Andrews, Program Director for Youth Development at the YEF Institute, at (202) 626-3039 or andrews@nlc.org to learn more about youth master planning and other ways in which city leaders are building an infrastructure to support children, youth, and families.
Michael Karpman is Program Associate for Outreach at the National League of Cities’ Institute for Youth, Education, and Families in Washington, D.C. His email is karpman@nlc.org.
About NLC’s Institute for Youth, Education, and Families
The National League of Cities (NLC) is the oldest and largest national organization representing municipal governments throughout the United States. Its mission is to strengthen and promote cities as centers of opportunity, leadership, and governance.
The Institute for Youth, Education, and Families (YEF Institute), a special entity within NLC, helps municipal leaders take action on behalf of the children, youth, and families in their communities. NLC launched the Institute in January 2000 in recognition of the unique and influential roles that mayors, city councilmembers, and other local leaders can play in strengthening families and improving outcomes for children and youth. Responsive to municipal leaders on a wide range of issues, the YEF Institute focuses on five core program areas: education and afterschool; early childhood success; youth development; safety of children and youth; and family economic success.
The YEF Institute is a national resource, providing guidance and assistance to municipal officials, compiling and disseminating information on promising strategies and best practices, building networks of local officials working on similar issues and concerns, and conducting research on the key challenges facing municipalities in these core program areas. It collaborates with a broad range of national partners and works with the nation’s 49 state municipal leagues to reach local officials in over 19,000 cities and towns across America.
To learn more about the YEF Institute’s work, visit the YEF Institute website, leave a message on the YEF Institute’s information line at (202) 626-3014, or contact iyef@nlc.org.
