Lacombe County wins planning award for annual review process
Lacombe County has been awarded the 2024 Planning Award of Merit for Implementation Success by the Alberta Professional Planners Institute.
The award recognizes Lacombe County’s annual review process of the Municipal Development Plan (MDP) and Land Use Bylaw (LUB) as an innovative, forward-thinking, and collaborative approach to ensure the County’s planning framework remains up-to-date and aligned with the community’s vision and ongoing trends in planning.
The award was presented to Lacombe County planning services staff during an awards luncheon on July 10, 2024 at the Canadian Institute of Planners / Alberta Professional Planners Institute Conference in Edmonton.
“When we originally contemplated the idea of doing an annual review in 2017, we couldn’t find any other case studies where an annual review approach was used as a successful implementation tool in Alberta,” says Cajun Paradis, senior planner. “Nonetheless, we decided to take the bold move to incorporate an annual review requirement into our Municipal Development Plan. Essentially, every year, we give our Plan a report card showing whether its policies have met expectations. Fast forward six years later, this has proved to be a highly effective and successful tool that has allowed us to continuously improve and refine our planning policy to be current and relevant.”