Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Community Programs topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Focus groups find strong satisfaction, low awareness of some facilities; city to test ideas in strategic plan
Summary
A Cultural Edge focus-group study presented to the Community Services Commission found high resident satisfaction with Lake Forest amenities but lower awareness among younger and Spanish-dominant residents; the report recommended targeted marketing, more multicultural and off-summer programming, and options to support hobbies and rentals.
"Lake Forest is very proud of its community services offerings and puts a lot of effort and and money into them," Communications and Marketing Manager Jonathan Voltski said as he introduced a consultant presentation to the Community Services Commission on Feb. 5.
JB Fabridge of Cultural Edge told commissioners that qualitative focus groups were used to explore how well city offerings serve a changing and more diverse population. "It's more exploratory in nature," Fabridge said, explaining his team's goal was to surface issues the city might not capture in a survey.
The consultant reported broadly positive feedback about the city's parks, trails and community amenities. "People love living here, they love that it's safe and clean, it's family friendly, a small town vibe," Fabridge said. At the same time, he said younger residents and Spanish-dominant Latino residents showed the lowest awareness of programs and rental options. Fabridge noted the Performing Arts Center and some rental facilities generated strong interest among participants who had not previously known those spaces were available.
Key findings and suggestions presented to the commission included: - High overall satisfaction with facilities and programming but gaps in awareness, especially among younger cohorts and Spanish-dominant residents. - Strong demand for pickleball, and interest in more courts, lessons and programming to serve that demand. - Interest in more multicultural events and diversity in concert lineups and festivals to attract broader audiences. - Opportunity to promote facility rentals (banquet hall/gazebo/conference rooms) more actively to capture wedding, corporate and cultural-event markets; designers suggested marketing images showing event set-ups for weddings or cultural celebrations. - A large list of program ideas and hobbies (e.g., cooking, woodworking, dance, citizenship test prep, language book clubs) that residents suggested could be supported either by city programming or by enabling resident-led activities. - Marketing and communications recommendations: improve reminders for events, provide opt-in notifications by topic and medium, and redesign the website for easier event discovery; the firm Revise was named as the contracted website developer and staff said a redesigned site is expected by August.
Deputy City Manager McGovern told the commission staff already has started to incorporate several findings and will use the upcoming strategic planning and budget process to prioritize changes. "We've already taken some of the findings and started to incorporate them," McGovern said, adding that focus-group issues that warrant broader testing could be added to the biannual quantitative survey.
Commissioners discussed several operational ideas raised during the presentation — for example, using the Performing Arts Center for winter events, staging more concerts and adding culturally diverse acts — and asked staff to consider staffing and scheduling implications. Several commissioners praised the report and indicated the study's recommendations would be considered in the spring strategic plan and next budget cycle.
The consultant and communications staff said they would return with implementation suggestions and that specific ideas could be tested with a larger survey if the council or commission wanted to measure community-wide support before allocating budget.
