2021 GPA Fall Chapter Awards
The Georgia Planning Association recognizes and honors the projects and efforts of our members and their communities via our Annual Chapter Awards at the 2021 Fall Joint Conference. This program not only showcases the great planning work being done in Georgia, but it allows us all to learn from one another and draw inspiration from the success of others as we look to help our communities achieve their best.
This year GPA recognized award winners in four different categories.
- Distinguished Planning Leadership in Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
- Outstanding Public Involvement
- Outstanding Planning Process
- Outstanding Planning Document
View the Powerpoint Presentation in Full
Award Category: Distinguished Planning Leadership in Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
Project Name: Better Together Advisory Board
Award Winners: City of Decatur and Sycamore Consulting
This is our newest award category which was created to recognize the need for community planning efforts to truly consider how we involve the people we are pledged to serve. The Better Together Advisory Board is a standing body that regularly works to bridge the gaps between the City leadership and the citizens, creating a means for which a conscious effort is placed into improving communication and outreach and reviewing how City policies impact different populations. The review committee considered this a laudatory effort to proactively build community togetherness.
Award Category: Outstanding Public Involvement
Project Name: Downtown Dallas Livable Centers Initiative Study
Award Winners: City of Dallas and TSW Consulting
This Downtown Dallas Livable Centers Initiative Study featured a diverse array of public input opportunities (including four different online platforms!) and used documents depicting fictional personas representing different user groups to help make the issues and objectives relatable.
Award Category: Outstanding Planning Process
Project Name: Destination 2030: Decatur Strategic Plan
Award Winners: City of Decatur and TSW Consulting
The 2021 award for Outstanding Planning Process went to the City of Decatur and TSW Consulting for the Destination 2030: Decatur Strategic Plan. This project was intended to create an end product that would serve as three plans in one. The project was an already massive undertaking when the consultants had to pivot in response to the Covid-19 pandemic conditions. The resulting process still garnered tremendous involvement due to the outreach process, and the commitment to making the process and final documents user-friendly yielded a document that reviewers found “of high quality, engaging, and efficient.”
Award Category: Outstanding Planning Document
Project Name: Southern Fulton Transportation Plan
Award Winners: Modern Mobility Partners
The award for Outstanding Planning Document went to Modern Mobility Partners for their work on the Southern Fulton Transportation Plan. Lauded for being such a comprehensive, yet effective, assessment of needs, this document serves as the planning guide for eight different municipalities, covered all modes of transportation, and involved work with at least 15 other key stakeholder agencies. The final product featured simple breakdowns of needs, objectives, and action items, all weighed against the realistic resources available to the participating communities.
