Longboat Needs a Great Marketing Campaign

Every Longboater should look at the lists below of the best places to live or retire in America and be mad that we are not even in the top 100, much less in the top three communities.

http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2010/real_estate/1009/gallery.best_places_retire.moneymag/index.html?hpt=C2

http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2010/real_estate/1009/gallery.Where_we_retired/

I believe that the our efforts as a community might be better spent on public relations and marketing rather than on some visioning statement crafted by five self-appointed residents who all appear to favor over-development of our community. If Longboat was in the top five of lists such as the one above, it might prove to be a far more effective means of revitalizing our community than a few people mincing words.


The original vision plan was crafted by three hundred self-appointed business people, many of whom did not live on the island, and a smattering of residents. Mr. Marlowe, the professional coordinator hired by the town, stated that the process was incomplete, just because it was created by a self-appointed group. Marlowe recommended that the process be validated by a professionally conducted statistical survey of the entire community. The funds were appropriated by the commission for the survey. Then unfortunately a four member committee was created to finalize the vision statement and arrange for the survey. Unfortunately the committee was composed of two members who were in favor of the vision plan and two members who were opposed to it. The result was a stillborn vision plan that was never presented to the residents for their approval. To say that the vision plan was validated by the referendum on rebuilding and replacing tourist units is specious at best since these two issues were not part of the vision plan; sort of like comparing apples to giraffes.


Now we have an even less representative clique of five like-minded members of the commission, planning board, PIC and the chamber crafting a transparently pro-development vision document that they intend to foist off on the community without any validation at all. To me it appears that we are headed backwards towards less inclusive, less representative government, controlled by a few that can only benefit a few by design.


Five years ago the taxpayers of this island spent $125,000.00 to fashion a vision plan that was never approved by the residents, and is now dated and economically irrelevant. What is happening now is even more irrelevant since in is unrepresentative of the residents by purposeful design.


Instead let's be great marketers like the other communities in the above list, that are receiving national praise as desirable places to live and retire. A vision plan is just a piece of paper that will be blown about by the winds of socio-economic realities. On this I agree with Al Green. I believe we need superlative marketing much more than we need well crafted documents that will most likely have little to no affect on the future of the island.


Perhaps a real vision plan effort that is representative of the entire community, not just the business people, might produce a more dynamic statement of intent that will serve the many rather than the few. It might even focus on what is working well for other communities - marketing and public relations on a national scale.