Officials, Residents Discuss Future of Wentzville-Lake Saint Louis-O'Fallon Area

It was a group that you don't often see all together in one room: mayors, school district superintendents, aldermen, city staffers, fire district officials and concerned citizens from the cities of O'Fallon, Lake Saint Louis and Wentzville.

St. Louis Regional Sustainable Communities brought them all together March 29 to get their input on goals, priorities and concerns for their communities.

The Regional Plan for Sustainable Development is a partnership with the goal of creating a regional plan to implement sustainable practices "by sharing knowledge, best practices, and recourses; connecting local, regional, state and federal planning efforts; and making federal and local investments more effective and efficient," according to a RPSD publication.

hosted the event. Ten round tables were filled, and extra chairs were brought in. Participants were given electronic response cards, which gave a nearly instant response to questions asked during the presentation.

Aaron Young, a sustainability planner with the East-West Gateway Council of Governments, gave the presentation and asked questions such as "If land becomes available for development, what would you like to see there?" and "What kind of businesses would you like to see come to your city?"

Young also posed questions about housing, transportation priorities and environmental concerns.

Last week's meeting was the first of four planned for the LSL-O'Fallon-Wentzville planning area. "We want to ensure that a planning process is based on what local community folks want to see happen," Young said.

When the presentation and polling were over, participants were broken into small groups for discussion about the strengths and weaknesses of their communities.

You can find more information about St. Louis Sustainable Communities at www.ewgateway.org/rpsd.