West Side Grows Together is looking to update its Revitalization Plan in Wilmington.
West Side Grows Together is a collaborative working with the community for over 11 years, and its next step is engaging neighborhoods on Wilmington’s West Side to update the revitalization plan.
The group has launched a community survey to help update the plan, hoping to get diverse resident and stakeholder feedback to help shape the future of the West Side community for the next 10 years.
The plan was originally developed in 2011 and used to guid the resident-driven initiative.
Sarah Lester is the President and CEO of Cornerstone West CDC – which serves as the fiscal agent and backbone for West Side Grows Together. She says the plan focuses on five core pillars.
"We have this foundation, this plan, these pillars that we've been working on for 10 plus years which are things that you might expect like affordable housing development, economic development, community safety, improving our parks and gardens, and looking at youth opportunities. Those are areas that we currently do a lot of work in and we do that with our coalition," said Lester.
Lester adds the plan has renovated five playgrounds over the course of its first decade which was highlighted in the original safety and the updated five-year plan.
She says this update is about seeing what worked and what is still needed.
"At the same time that we look back a bit we obviously want to go back out in the community, talk to folks, have some stakeholder groups and understand what are the needs in the community,” said Lester. “Are they still consistent with what was in the 10-year plan? What needs to change? What needs to shift? And then map out a route and a plan to accomplish those goals in that vision."
Lester notes the group has leveraged millions of dollars for improvements on the west side since the first plan was created.
