Regional Plan Components

While it has many moving parts, the core principle and goal of GROWashington-Aroostook is to increase median income in the region. This large geographic region comprises over 9,200 square miles and is home to slightly more than 100,000 residents. It is predominantly rural with a natural resource-based economy including forest products, agriculture, tourism, and marine resources. Healthcare, education and a growing information technology sector round out the other major employment industries.

GROWashington-Aroostook is a multi-year initiative with four fundamental objectives:

Development of a sustainable growth plan for the Washington and Aroostook region, including implementation steps for state and local government, recommendations for private sector stakeholders, and establishing a solid foundation for the new Aroostook Washington Economic Development District.
Large-scale public education to increase visibility and awareness of regional issues related to the economy, environment, and quality of life.
Region-wide civic engagement in the planning process with special attention to populations not traditionally involved in planning processes. This will help scope, understand and adopt regional planning elements thereby improving the efficiency of local Comprehensive Planning in this largely rural area.
Institutional capacity and relationship building throughout the region, linking technology and information to community decision making for current and future planning processes.

Each GROWashington-Aroostook regional plan component has a Workgroup - some are in each county, some are region-wide, and some will work on more than one component. All Workplan Components and Workgroup activity is outcome driven with much collaboration and interplay between groups and across the region.