Sept. 16, 1998
RiverForum4 was held on a warm Wednesday September 16th evening at the St. Cloud Kelly Inn. Twenty-one river residents, river users, and interested citizens participated in workshop activities that finalized 20 significance statements that reflect the unique character and condition of the Mississippi River in the study area.
Recap of previous meetings:
RiverForum1 - Participants identified significant features of the Mississippi River and developed vision statements for the year 2018.
RiverForum2 - Participants voiced opinions on 26 statements (developed at RiverForum1) regarding significant features of the Mississippi River.
RiverForum3 - New participants were given an opportunity to voice opinions on the 26 significance statements, and then asked to refine or delete statements which had high group disagreement.
Original 26 Mississippi River Significance Statements
Workshop Activity I
In this RiverForum4, participants were asked to give a final review of the statements and determine if they adequately reflected what was significant and unique about the Mississippi River. Participants were also asked to object to any statement they did not want to see used to guide river management discussion and decision making. Consent agreement was reached on all 20 statements.
Download document of the 20 significance statements agreed upon by RiverForum4.
Mississippi River Significance Statements [PDF/29KB]
These statements will be used to guide discussion and decision-making during the process to rewrite the Mississippi River Management Plan.
Workshop Activity II
A second workshop exercise was conducted to help participants understand what kind of relationship or influence the 149 issues and concerns identified by participants at the January/February 1998 open houses have on the recently approved significance statements. Relationship tables were filled out by participants indicating whether the issue or concern theme had a strong or weak relationship with (or influence on) the significance statements.
Lastly, RiverForum Four participants were asked to participate in a straw poll in which they indicated which issue and concern themes they would like to address in-depth first. The themes receiving the most votes were:
- Development in general
- Sensitive and critical environmental resources
- River Access
- Water quality
This information will be used to help formulate discussion topics for upcoming RiverForums.