The Richland County Planner Office, the City/County Planning Board and the Richland County Health Department work together to develop a County-wide Conference.
The Conference is a tool utilized to identify ways which their policies can be implemented and to gather data for future policy updates.

2006 Richland County Growth Policy
2009 Richland County Community Strategic Plan

As a result of the conferences held 7 Action Groups were formed to assist in implementing the policies, and to address Richland County's commuities issues and needs identified in the policies and from the data collected during the conferences.

was held in January of 2010

Discussion topics included:

News Articles relating to the 3rd Annual Conference were written and published in the local news papers:

County-wide conference features discussion on physical health resources, by Bill Vander Weele, Sidney Herald, published January 26, 2010
Let your voice be heard at annual county-wide conference this week, article that was publish in the Sidney Herald on January 19, 2010
Speaker selected for county-wide conference by Alicia Sparks, AmeriCorps VISTA, published January 14, 2010
Outlining Richland County Action Groups by Louisa Barbar, Sidney Herald published December 31, 2009, final article in series.
Outlining Action Groups by Louisa Barbar, Sidney Herald published December 29, 2009, second article in series.
Sorting out the Action Groups by Louisa Barbar, Sidney Herald published December 24, 2009, first artilce in series.
Let your voice be heard at county-wide conference, by Alicia Sparks, AmeriCorps VISTA, published October 27,2009

was held in January of 2009 in Sidney, Montana.

The 2nd Annual Conference provided 108 attendees the opportunity to participate
in 8 concurrent discussion topic sessions. The attendees provided input on communities' needs, issues, and challenges on the topics of: Housing, Physical Health Resources, Educational & Cultural Development, Natural Resources, Youth Opportunities & Development, Transportation & Public Facilities, Public Safety, and Economy & Community Development.

The data collected from each of the sessions was tabulated and compiled in a Confernece Report. Click here to access the report. This report may take a few minutes to download, so please be patient.

In preparation for the 2nd Annual Conference several news articles were written and published in the local news papers:

"Residents discuss goals for expanding economic base" article was published in the Sidney Herald on January 27, 2009.
"Lack of housing remains cocern" article published in the Sidney Herald on January 27, 2009.
"County conference helps put area in right direction" article published in the Sidney Herald January 27, 2009.
"Act to make county better place to live" article was published in both the Sidney Herald and The Roundup on January 5, 2009.
"Economy, community development is it important to you?" article was published in both the Sidney Herald and The Roundup on December 31, 2008
"Conference to provide bright future for Richland County youth" article was published in both the Sidney Herald and The Roundup on December 24, 2008.
"Share views on transportation, public facilities" article was published in Sidney Herald on December 24, 2008.
"Plan to Attend the 2nd Annual State of the Community County-wide Conference" article was published in the Roundup on December 17, 2008.
"Help Preserve Growth, Diverse Natural, Cultural and Educational Resourse in Richland County" article was published in both the Sidney Herald and The Roundup on December 10, 3008.
"Input sourght for Housing, physical health resources" article was published in Sidney Herald on November 18, 2008.
"Plans under way for county-wide conference" article was published in Sidney Herald on November4, 2008
"Action croups under way in Richland County" article was published in the Sidney Herald on October 14, 2008.
"Second county-wide conference to focus on action" article was published in the Sidney Herald on October 5, 2008.

was held in March of 2008, with a a total of 13 breakout sessions,

The Session Notes were compiled from each of the breakout session.

The City/County Planning Board's goal from the Conference outcome is to identify ways in which the 2006 Richland County Growth Policy is being implemented and how the Board can update the policy.
A document was created by the Planning Board using the Session Notes to identfy how the Growth Policy Goals and Objectives can be updated and how they are being implemented.

In preparations for the first conference several news articles were written and published in the local news papers.

If you would like to learn more about the conference or to obtain a copy of the materails gathered from the conferences you may contact the Planner Office at (406) 433-6886 or submit an email request.

City/County Planning Board