Otis White of Civic Strategies has just finished compiling the thoughts of all 741 citizens who participated in the first session of Decatur’s Strategic Planning meetings and has boiled all your hopes and dreams into five “major” themes and three “additional” themes.

5 Major Themes

• The Diverse Community
• The Involved Community
• The Complete Community
• The Alternative Transportation Community
• The Responsive and Cooperative Community

3 Additional Themes

• The Innovative and Distinctive Community
• The Green Community
• The Active and Healthy Community

I’ve provided his short summary for each of these after the jump.  For greater elaboration on the eight themes and to read every single thing that was suggested or mentioned at Session 1, check out White’s full report HERE on DecaturNext.

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I thought this was an interesting little Decatur tidbit.  From the city’s Decatur Tax Blog…

…the largest tax exempt property owners in Decatur are DeKalb County, Agnes Scott, the City of Decatur, Columbia Seminary, the Decatur Housing Authority, DeKalb Medical, the First Baptist Church, Decatur First United Methodist Church, MARTA, and Decatur Presbyterian Church. Two final notes: 1) Decatur’s tax-exempt owners do pay stormwater bills and 2) they’re also some of the largest employers in town.

From the Decatur Education Foundation’s Executive Director, Gail Rothman…

Several prominent Decatur residents who played an instrumental role in founding and building the Decatur Education Foundation were honored for their service at the Foundation’s May 20th Dinner. Leaving the Foundation board are members Candler Broom, Susan Cobleigh, James Eley, Bill Funk, Gayle Gellerstedt, Lyn Menne, Jimmy Smith, Judy Turner and Sara Turnipseed.

The Foundation welcomed to the board Andrea Arnold, Michael Baxter, Ann Berg, Han Choi, Derrick Gervin, Paula Herrema, Shelley Parnes, Roy Reese, Todd Speed and Leah Vaughn.

More than a year after we first caught wind of Palate Wine Bar’s plans to build pub adjacent to their current location inside Oakhurst’s Scottish Rite, I received a report a few days back that construction on McGowan’s Pub finally looked to be under way.

An email back from Palate’s Jill Alikonis confirms it…

It’s true, we are building McGowan’s Oakhurst Pub. We plan to get rolling in 3-4 months. Open for lunch, dinner, and late night; 22 beers on draft.