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Endings and Beginnings...
As you may have already heard, I have resigned from Valley Vision after almost seven years as CEO. My final day will be mid-to-late February. An ending, certainly, but also a beginning, since the end of anything is always a doorway to someplace new – an opportunity for expansion and new adventures. Only this – the prospect of a new way to use the incredible amount of learning and growing I have experienced over the years – would lure me from the very special place that Valley Vision has become. Few organizations can boast of such talented staff and, more important, a staff that brings their hearts to work along with their minds and hands. Those who have spent time our offices know it as a welcoming place of laughter and warmth, and, of course, always good food. While I am certainly pleased with the substantial growth in every measure of success for Valley Vision during my tenure, I am most proud of creating a special place to work. That is the best way to ensure that Valley Vision continues to grow and be a positive influence for quality of life.
It is also a beginning for my very capable replacement, Bill Mueller, who has been a Managing Partner of Valley Vision for more than two years and assumed the CEO role as of Jan. 14. But it is hardly the beginning of Bill’s impact in the region. He was already a well-respected community leader before joining Valley Vision, holding key roles with Intel and the Metro Chamber. He has followed that with leadership on several key projects at Valley Vision, as well as joining Kristine Mazzei in partnering with me on the management of Valley Vision. Our collaborative leadership model is one of the many ways we try and “walk the talk’ as we work to fulfill our mission.
So stay tuned! The organization has just moved into a more permanent home at 2320 Broadway, and is primed to continue to thrive. I offer my sincere congratulations to Bill, and a heartfelt thank you to all of you for your support, friendship and contributions to the success of Valley Vision in these past years. I look forward to continuing my friendship with you all.
With warm regards,
 Nominations, sponsorships open for Legacy of Leadership Awards
A friendly reminder that we’re accepting nominations for the 2008 Valley Vision Legacy of Leadership Awards on May 22. We distribute awards for individuals, organizations or businesses that have demonstrated exceptional leadership in the areas of the economy, social equity and the environment in our six-county region. Nominations are closed, but we’re still accepting sponsorships for this year’s event. Last year’s sold out, so act soon!
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Valley Vision gains regional award
SACOG hasannounced its annual SACOG Salutes awards for promoting quality of life on a regional level – and our very own Susan Frazier is one of the winners! Susan received special recognition for Distinguished Service and Community Outreach in the SACOG Region at the agency’sDec. 20 board meeting. Congrats to Susan for the acknowledgement of her years of effort to enhance our region and its quality of life! For more on the value of regional leadership, read Susan’s recent editorial in the Sacramento Bee!
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Now Appearing: Valley Vision On Broadway
We’ve moved! Our offices are now at 2320 Broadway, between 23rd and 24th streets in the Tower commercial district. Our phone number is the same: (916) 325-1630. It’s the first time we’ve leased our own building independent of another organization, a sign of the rapid growth in recent years that’s taken us from a single employee to a staff of nine. We previously leased space at Lionakis Beaumont Design Group and the Sierra Health Foundation with generous assistance from both organizations. Former Sierra Health Foundation CEO Len McCandliss is a Valley Vision founder, and LBDG President Bruce Starkweather is currently a Valley Vision board member (thanks for your support). We hope you’ll stop by.
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Talented new staffer joins Valley Vision
We’re pleased to announce the addition of Angela Shepard as a Project Associate. Angela recently graduated from UC Davis with a bachelor’s degree in Community and Regional Development, and helped produce environmental documents and business profiles while interning at the City of Roseville. Welcome!
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 Partnership for Prosperity
After a year of successful action in support of the Sacramento region’s fast-growing clean energy technology sector, major partners in the Partnership for Prosperity Clean Energy Action Team decided at a strategic planning session to redouble their efforts this year.
The Clean Energy Action or “CET” team was born as one of four “action teams” launched to implement the 2006 Partnership for Prosperity regional business plan. With a year of work and momentum under their belts, team members now hope to contribute and secure enough resources to make the clean-energy effort a regional initiative on the scale of the Partnership for Prosperity itself.
This enhanced effort is an acknowledgement that growing our region’s clean energy tech sector means paying attention to an “ecosystem” of actions, from boosting direct economic development assistance to enhancing workforce development to supporting public policy that enhances regional sustainability – and thus the market for clean technologies.
Valley Vision will continue to coordinate the team, which includes a core group of roughly a dozen organizations and an advisory roster of dozens of regional leaders ranging from corporate heads to local electeds. The team’s recent series of interviews with clean-tech CEOs will help inform our efforts.
Details: Kristine Mazzei or Jon Jeisel.
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 Community Needs Assessment
New Healthy Living Map helps democratize health information
After months of careful planning, the area’s four nonprofit health systems and project manager Valley Vision have jointly unveiled an innovative new Web site designed to improve the public’s access to community health data and resources. The Healthy Living Map at www.healthylivingmap.com allows visitors to view health data such as rates of youth obesity, asthma, diabetes, and heart disease by ZIP code on a satellite map of Sacramento, Yolo, Placer and El Dorado counties.
The map is part of an every-three-year study called the “Community Needs Assessment” undertaken by the area’s four nonprofit health systems – Catholic Healthcare West/Mercy, Kaiser Permanente, Sutter Health Sacramento Sierra Region and UC Davis Medical System – to identify the needs of the underinsured and uninsured. The online map augments the paper report that’s traditionally produced.
Read more in the Sacramento Bee news and editorial pages. Details: Bill Mueller or Chris Aguirre.
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 Cleaner Air Partnership Cleaner Air Partnership zeroes in on barriers to smarter growth
It’s no secret that land use has become a major air quality strategy in recent years. “Infill” development that concentrates development on unused or under-used land within existing communities is a strategy to promote fewer and shorter car trips and more walking and biking. But this style of smarter growth also brings its own challenges and obstacles.
The Cleaner Air Partnership is completing a six-month study that aims to help promote infill development by identifying major barriers to infill, prioritizing those that could be addressed locally and sharing this information and a menu of possible solutions with key decisionmakers across the six-county region.
The Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality Management District is providing major financial support for the project, which is being managed by Valley Vision with guidance from clean-air partners Breathe California of Sacramento-Emigrant Trails, the Sacramento Metro Chamber and more than two dozen stakeholder organizations. Check back soon!
Details: Bill Mueller or Jon Jeisel.
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Study cites Regional Blueprint as model for civic engagement & climate change
A national study on development and climate change cited urban development as both a key contributor to climate change and an essential factor in combating it. And it highlighted the Sacramento region and its Regional Blueprint process as a model for land-use planning and civic engagement and a climate-change tool.
Valley Vision assisted the Sacramento Area Council of Governments in strategic development and civic outreach for the Blueprint Transportation and Land Use Study, which looks at the six-county region’s growth through 2050 and emphasizes infill and mixed-use development, alternate transportation modes and other principles.
According to Growing Cooler: The Evidence on Urban Development and Climate Change, the Sacramento region’s growth visioning exercise is one of the best examples in the country. It involved an extensive public outreach process, cutting-edge computer modeling software and detailed baseline forecasts to educate and explore the effects of different growth scenarios in coming decades.
The report was coordinated by Smart Growth America and involved leading urban planning researchers at the University of Maryland, the University of Utah, Fehr and Peers Associates, the Center for Clean Air Policy and the Urban Land Institute.
The adopted preferred Blueprint scenario, which is the basis of our region’s new transportation plan, features sophisticated infill development and transportation investments that will produce 12.3 fewer daily vehicle-miles of travel per household by 2050, a 27 percent reduction below the baseline.
Details: read the Business Journal article or the Growing Cooler report.
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Find out more about the Valley Vision Leadership Council
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