Dauphin Island Final Report - October 2007

The Dauphin Island Strategic Planning Consultant Team prepared a Final Report and First Five Years of Implementation Recommendaions to present the work of the community throughout its Strategic Panning procss for improving its abilities to achieve sustainability. This report can be read in its entirety by going to the DI Strategic Planning Final Report.

Approximately 1,000 Dauphin Island stakeholders participated (through surveys, workshops, Internet programming, personal conversations, etc.) over the last eight months to identify the important focus areas and strategic actions that will move the community toward sustainability. Major areas identified for potential improvement included community development, environmental protection, economic improvement, unified governance, and means for capitalizing on the Island’s cultural assets and tourism/recreational resources. Large-scale measures the community believes are needed include (1) re-design of a downtown village business district – that retains a small-town feel – closely linked with all other commercial efforts, (2) new and improved efforts by the four Island governing entities to cooperate in a more flexible, adaptable manner, (3) the development of programs for sustaining the Island’s beaches and dunes, (4) promotion of low-impact development on the Island’s east end to protect a major source of drinking water (groundwater) and all other natural resources, and (5) evaluation of potential re-development of the Island’s west end beach area, including the consideration of alternative improvement concepts – in contrast to the single-family, large square-footage homes – that can equally provide significant revenue sources to the Town.

A new spirit has emerged from a number of Dauphin Island residents that speaks to the urgency for change and progress on the Island. This spirit will be best served if the Dauphin Island community and its leaders are able to maintain a system’s thinking approach to their deliberations for moving forward with improvements. And this path forward will require sincere efforts for cooperation and collaboration from all stakeholders, as outlined in this report.