Notes on the Community Values Measure

Stanley King created the Community Values Measure in 2001 as a new planning tool that enables a community to define its values and to measure development proposals to calculate the support they give to the community values.

The community creates its own Values Measure starting with the visioning of imaginative possibilities for the future. Values are based on the preferred round of daily activities and special events that the community visualizes in the improved environment. Values are illustrated to form an image survey for the community to give each value a numerical rating. Development proposals are scored for their support of each value.

The Community Values Measure is in process of development in the Town of Fort MacLeod, Alberta and in the Cities of Lethbridge and Red Deer, Alberta. Planners in the Town of Fort MacLeod, and the cities of Lethbridge, Red Deer and Calgary have commented on the usefulness of the Community Values Measure.

1. For the community:

1. Provides a harmonious process for achieving the community values
2. Involves the whole community, youth and adult, in defining and rating the values
3. Converts loose statements to hard numbers
4. Calculates community input with a degree of scientific accuracy

2. For the developer:

5. Provides community values for developers to evaluate their own proposals
6. Evaluates all development proposals on the same basis
7. Answers developers’ questions on the wants of the community

3. For the planner and council:

1. Guides the proactive search for development options
2. Gives planners a list of improvements to upgrade a development proposal
3. Aims primarily for the healthy vitality of the community and its sustainability