Lancaster County Strategic Plan

The County is seeking to create its first true comprehensive Strategic Plan to chart the future of the County. The key objective of this RFP is to identify the right partner for the County who is capable of successfully facilitating a visioning process with County Council and community input to translate the community’s shared vision into a planning document with goals and tasks that will help shape decisions related to service enhancements, program development, and capital and operating budget expenditures for the next three to five years. The selected firm will work with County Council, County Administration, key staff, and community stakeholders to develop a County-wide Strategic Plan. Selected firm will also identify a methodology for developing the strategic plan and identify key milestones, deliverables, and an engagement strategy for key stakeholders. Additionally, firm shall identify and analyze County of Lancaster studies and planning documents relevant to the County-wide Strategic Plan, such as the 2040 comprehensive plan and prior strategic documents. The County is estimating the planning process will take six to ten months to provide adequate time to establish an outreach approach, research, garner robust citizen engagement and input, perform analysis, and strategize opportunities, along with development of the implementation plan that will guide the County for the defined time frame with key focus areas and performance indicators. The final plan will be presented to County Council for adoption and implementation. The strategic plan will guide policy development, prioritize demands and opportunities, and ultimately generate a plan to realize a defined vision. This important tool will be developed with specific goals, targets, measures, milestones, and strategies. The County-wide strategic plan shall include methods and timelines for future strategic plan updates and revisions to make the plan a “living document.” Specifically, this visioning process with the County’s citizenry should build a stronger relationship between the community and local government by developing a shared set of priorities; and help us identify options, consider opportunities, and determine any trade-offs that may be necessary to reach our goals. The vision process should recognize the transitioning nature of the County by acknowledging the past and present state of the community, but also focus on the future, particularly given the rapid growth throughout the county and number of new residents. The County is aware that there are a variety of perspectives, models, and approaches available to develop a strategic planning document; therefore, the successful firm should be able to discern which model or model(s) will best enable the County to complete its organizational and programmatic goals listed in the Scope of Work.