CATTARAUGUS COUNTY PLANNING BOARD RELEASES TWO NEW GUIDEBOOKS CALLED "SAVING OUR VILLAGES" AND "GROWING THE EQUESTRIAN ECONOMY IN CATTARAUGUS COUNTY"
The County Planning Board presented the Cattaraugus County Legislature with its latest guidebooks, Volumes 3 and 8 of the County's award-winning Smart Development for Quality Communities Guidebooks Series on April 27, 2005.
These guidebooks were completed as a part of the County's Allegany State Park Perimeter Study, and recommend strategies for renewing villages and expanding the already growing equestrian economy in Cattaraugus County.
The first of the two guidebooks (Volume 3) is called "Saving Our Villages" and presents the results of visioning work with municipalities by the county's consultants, Randall Arendt and Richard Swist and the Cattaraugus County Department of Economic Development Planning and Tourism. Gerard Fitzpatrick, Chairman of the County Legislature said,
"It gives all of us a new priority to help villages as we begin our journey into the 21st Century. Villages have existing water, sewer, roads, housing, retail and industry, and we should not neglect village needs. We now have a strategy to help villages".
The second guidebook (Volume 8) is called "Growing the Equestrian Economy in Cattaraugus County, New York". Jerry Burrell, Chairman of the County's Development and Agriculture Committee, said,
"This unique study establishes that our County has an important and growing equestrian community. Our consultants Richard Swist and Jo-Anne Young give us new facts, ideas and proposals to promote equestrian development. It shows us how problems and challenges can be solved by the equestrian community."
William Sprague, Chairman County Planning Board stated,
"These new guidelines show how our villages once thrived, declined, and are coming back again. It is our hope that these guidebooks will become valuable references for ideas on renewing villages and for motivating stakeholders to support village renewal. The Equestrian guidebook encourages horse owners and investors to take advantage of our County's rural ambiance, open space, village staging areas, a growing trails network, and our great scenic beauty."
Terry Martin, the County's Chief Planner, said,
"Our consultants want us to make villages and horses central to the County's economic development strategies. They ask us to begin thinking along marketing lines".
Both of these guidebooks are available as PDF downloads on the County's website (www.cattco.org, click on Advance Planning, Guide Books for Cattaraugus County [Saving our Villages and Growing the Equestrian Economy in Cattaraugus County]). For further information or questions concerning these guidebooks or any other guidebook in the series, contact Terry H. Martin at (716) 938-9111 Ext. 2313 or email at THMartin@cattco.org.
Announcement of New Economic Development Strategies in the County's Latest Guidebooks, "Saving Our Villages" and "Growing the Equestrian Economy in Cattaraugus County, New York"
The latest "visioning" guidebooks (Volume 3 and 8) in Cattaraugus County's technical assistance series called, Smart Development for Quality Communities are now available for distribution (Volumes 1 & 2 received the Governor's Quality Communities Award in 2002 and were adopted in 2004 as advisory land use policy the Cattaraugus County Legislature). These new guidebooks will be used to help obtain grants and to attract new investments for village and equestrian businesses.
The new guidebooks are "Saving Our Villages" and "Growing the Equestrian Economy in Cattaraugus County, New York". They present the results of our visioning work with the county consultants, Randall Arendt, Rick Swist and Jo-Anne Young from the past four years, who worked with our three demonstration villages, Randolph, Little Valley, and Franklinville and local equestrians.
In particular these new guidebooks illustrate:
- How new business and development are still possible for our villages and equestrians, based on finding and testing new ideas which have been developed by well-known consultants who worked with each community and the county during the past several years. The consultant's ideas are recommendations only and do not represent any commitments by the villages or the county (these are technical assistance documents).
- How renewal is possible, by encouraging stakeholders, sharing lessons learned with other communities so that each village is not faced with re-inventing the wheel; and by promoting villages as staging areas for trails and horses.
- How to include villages and horses in county and regional marketing campaigns in the coming decade, with the intent to attract new investments into Cattaraugus County. There is a large untapped market for horse-related activities in New York State and our region, and villages are natural staging areas.
These guidebooks were prepared by Cattaraugus County's Department of Economic Development, Planning and Tourism in collaboration with the County's consultants, Randall Arendt, Richard Swist and Jo-Anne Young.
Both of these guidebooks are available as PDF downloads on the county's website (www.cattco.org, click on Advance Planning, Guide Books for Cattaraugus County).