Sedgwick County officials presented an updated strategic plan to the Board of County Commissioners on Aug. 6 and commissioners voted to receive and file the document while requesting more outreach to citizen advisory groups before final adoption.

County Manager Tom Stoltz and Sarah Gooding of Wichita State University’s Public Policy and Management Center (PPMC) described a yearlong process of interviews, division‑level reviews and staff focus groups that produced a streamlined plan with five themes — service and resource optimization; workforce and culture; technology; internal communications; and public trust — each paired with strategies and key performance indicators that county leaders will use to measure progress.

Stoltz said the shorter “clean” document is intended to make goals and KPIs more visible to the public and to drive department-level planning and budgeting. Gooding said the team reviewed the 2019 plan, met with elected officials, local government leaders, state officials and county employees and distilled those findings into the current update. She said the result “takes all of that work, bridal it into the five goal areas” and added templates to guide departments in creating measurable KPIs.

Several commissioners raised concerns about public visibility and process. Commissioner Hall asked whether the new plan replaces the 2019 plan and said he would have preferred to see the full, long version together with the condensed document. Jane Lane of Human Resources clarified the mission, vision and values from 2019 remain unchanged and are part of the overall package; Stoltz and staff said a longer, more detailed worksheet version with department-level templates and next steps was available and would be posted and packaged with the shorter plan.

Commissioners said they wanted district advisory and other citizen boards to see the document. Staff said external stakeholder interviews had been conducted but district advisory boards had not been shown the draft; they offered to bring the plan to those boards and to finalize a combined package online. Lindsey Powers, chief financial officer, stressed time pressure: department-level strategic results and supporting KPIs must feed into the county’s 2026 budget process and the budget book needs strategic measures for November’s budget adoption.

After discussion the commission voted to receive and file the strategic plan update and directed staff to continue outreach, finalize the longer supporting documents and return to the commission for formal adoption before Q4. The transcript did not record a final adopted version or any changes to the mission, vision and values; staff said the next step was for departments to create nested strategic plans and measurable KPIs before the end of the year.