This project assists Teton County and its neighbor counties in transforming values important to citizens and the community into information that decision-makers can use to make better planning, land-use, and economic development decisions. These values reflect the natural and cultural heritage of the region, the hopes and dreams of citizens, the natural resource and scenic assets, and the desire to be resilient to economic, demographic, natural, and social changes.

In order to use this information to support local-government decisions, a team of professionals organized by Future West (a regional non-profit consulting group), including Geodata Services, is working with planners, resource managers, elected officials, citizens, and other partners from the region to pull together relevant data and maps. These will address issues such as transportation and infrastructure; important natural and cultural resource areas; medical, educational, and retail services; and housing, economic, and demographic characteristics.

The goal of this project is to create a regionally-based collaboration that will work to translate these shared values into information that guides decisions. Additionally it will build local capacity to work with data and maps, and find ways to share technical assistance.

The "Wordle" chart below (courtesy of www.wordle.net)shows the words the Rocky Mountain Front community used in a January, 2011 to describe core community values and objectives. The more often the word was submitted in respondent comments, the larger it is in the chart.

This project was funded through a competitive state-wide grant from the Montana Land Information Act. The project runs from October, 2010 through June, 2011. Hands on training and assistance in the use the data and maps is a major focus of this project. In the spring, community training will continue including workshops on the application of this information and these tools on a couple of local projects.