The Metropolitan Area Planning Council was established as a state agency in 1963. In 1971, the Council’s legislation was amended to make it an independent public body politic and corporate of the Commonwealth. The Council, consisting of 101 cities and towns in the metropolitan Boston area, is a regional planning and economic development district and is the federally designated economic development district. In addition, the Council shares oversight responsibility for the region’s federally funded transportation program as one of fourteen members of the Boston
Metropolitan Planning Organization.
The Council’s legislative mandate is to provide technical and professional resources to improve the physical, social and economic condition of its district. The Council enhances the quality of life and competitive advantage of the Boston metropolitan region in the global economy by providing a focus for action and developing sound responses to issues of regional significance. The Council’s deliberative process includes broad-based participation from government and the private, non-profit, academic and faith-based sectors. The Council offers research, studies, publications, facilitation and technical and professional assistance to these constituencies in the areas of land use and the environment, housing, transportation, water resources management, economic development, demographic and socioeconomic data, legislative policy
and interlocal partnerships that strengthen the efficient and effective operation of local governments.
In the last few years, the Council has provided critical leadership to several initiatives that respond to regional challenges and demands, some of which include:
· Participating in the establishment and management of the I-495 Initiative, a multi-sector forum that is examining growth impacts along the entire Interstate 495 corridor.
· Producing build-out analyses for 101 municipalities.
· Partnering with Workforce Investment Boards, Transportation Management Associations, Community Based Organizations and others in a US Department of Labor funded Welfare-to-Work project that focused on transportation barriers faced by low-income communities.
· Establishing Regional Services Consortiums that facilitate interlocal forums of municipal managers that foster regional communication, information exchange, resource sharing and collaborative action, including the collective purchasing of supplies and services.
· Facilitating the establishment of the Metropolitan Mayors Coalition consisting of ten mayors and city managers in the urban core that work on common planning, economic and social issues facing those local governments.
The Regional Visioning Project: Developing a Regional Growth Strategy for Metro Boston
In one of the most exciting developments in the last year, MAPC has launched a new civic process to create an updated Regional Growth Strategy for metropolitan Boston. MAPC is helping to facilitate this process, working with our 101 city and town governments and various other stakeholders in our region, including non-profits, business, labor and academic groups. The outcome will be a vision and strategy that puts the region on a sustainable path in terms of land use, economic, environmental and social issues. MAPC will need the support of a broad range of organizations in the region to help plan, fund and implement a new framework for addressing the challenges facing metropolitan Boston.
The Process Design Team, a group of more than 150 stakeholders from various fields and areas of expertise, continue to look for leaders in the MAPC region who would like to get involved and/or lend their support for this regional effort. Please contact MAPC if you would like to become involved in this process.
In October we welcomed Marc Draisen as the new Executive Director of MAPC. Marc has a diverse background, including service as a State Representative and most recently as Executive Director of the Massachusetts Association of Community Development Corporations. He is an expert in housing issues and regional collaboration.
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