The Sustainable Community Model Approach to the Development and Use of Multi-Dimensional Quality of Life Indicators

Abstract

Over the past five years, faculty with the Ohio State University Extension Community Development Program has been engaged in the design and application of a model that promotes sustainable community development at the local level. The development and use of multi-dimensional indicators linking the social, environmental and economic sectors of the community has been a cornerstone of this model, necessary for its success. These indicators have been developed by community residents themselves through series of community visioning sessions that were designed to be inclusionary, reduce barriers to participation, and articulate the community’s ethos. Experts were called upon to translate the indicators into effective measurements, but the residents and the community controlled the process throughout. Through application of multi-dimensional indicators, communities found an integration of social, environmental and economic goals resolved conflicts and increased their mutual awareness of and collaboration among competing local interests. They developed a system of indicators that will effectively monitor and provide direction to the community in achieving its goals. Known as the Sustainable Communities Program, this model has been applied to a rural Appalachian county in their formulation of a vision and community plan and with another in the development of their comprehensive plan. A third use of the model is with a college town in northern Ohio, also in the writing of their comprehensive plan. The lessons learned through the design and application of multi-dimensional quality of life indicators within a sustainable community context as applied to community planning will be the subject of this paper.