Tumwater council begins structured review of draft six-year strategic plan, sets timeline for adoption

Tumwater City Council members and staff used a Sept. 9 work session to begin a structured review of a draft six-year strategic plan, with staff proposing a three-session prioritization process and an implementation framework that will produce annual work plans tied to budget decisions. The council’s discussion focused on the plan’s structure, how action items will be prioritized and how staff will report annual work-plan progress.

The draft plan covers the period 2026–2032 and groups city goals into six focus areas: vibrant, livable and inclusive communities; environmental stewardship; community mobility; health and safety; growth and development; and Tumwater Excellence (organizational capacity). Staff recommended three additional work sessions to complete prioritization and said they will return a full draft in October for further review and a target adoption by resolution before November.

Staff described an implementation framework that will pair each action item with lead departments, timelines and annual work-plan activities. The plan’s appendix will include a sample annual work plan showing, for each focus area, the goal statement, action items, lead departments and the year-one activities staff expects to accomplish. "Each year, each focus area is going to have one of these council annual work plans associated with it," a staff member said.

Consultant Amy Lenaker is scheduled to facilitate a separate session on Sept. 20 about council processes and timelines for keeping the strategic plan current. Council members will apply prioritization criteria in the Sept. 23 and Oct. 14 work sessions to the remaining focus areas. Staff said the prioritization results will produce a numeric ordering of action items and will be used to inform annual budget proposals.

Council members and staff discussed expectations for reporting frequency and the practical limits of staff capacity. Brad (staff member) told the council some action items will have co-leads and long time horizons and that the plan is intended as a durable, multiyear guide, not a list of one-year projects. Staff repeatedly emphasized that the plan will be a "living" document with annual updates to work-plan activities.

Council members asked staff to clarify how new initiatives would be added midyear and how council priorities would be reflected in budget proposals. The staff response: use the annual council work plan as the mechanism to show how activities roll into budget decisions and to report back on progress during the year. "So the primary purpose of this document is so that the council can have a framework within which they have a conversation about priorities so that staff can then learn and understand and know what those priorities are," a staff member said.

No formal actions or votes were taken at the work session. The council and staff agreed to refine the prioritization questions and to try a condensed, more policy-oriented approach in the next session.

The council resumed other municipal business after the strategic-plan discussion and closed the meeting with routine calendar reminders.