USF looks to partner with Palmetto to help move the city into the future

The city of Palmetto has been chosen to be a part of the University of South Florida’s inaugural Community Sustainability Partnership Program, an initiative that engages students and faculty with communities.

According to Jeff Burton, director of Palmetto’s Community Redevelopment Agency, a number of USF students and their professors will converge on the city some time in August to begin assisting the city with various needs, ranging from designing its linear park and multi-modal trails, transportation designs, historic preservation, water sensitive urban design and much more.

“Anything the university does has a wide scope of expertise,” said Burton. “It could be anything from helping the CRA modify and make its incentives to helping foster communication between local government and the community so the community can be sure it has been vetted and asked what it wants.”

The CRA will pay $116,000 toward the project, with the city funding about $34,000 for programs that include helping to map the city’s utility system.

Kristine Williams, CSPP program manager and USF transportation planning professor, said the program is something USF has been trying to get off the ground for some time.

“Essentially what it does, is takes what we already do with community engagement and formalizes that whole partnership between the university and a single community,” said Williams. “It asks that community what are your important projects and what will help you achieve your sustainable goals.”

Based on that information, those projects are matched to faculty and students to help accomplish those goals.

“The beauty of this project is that it’s as diverse as the university is diverse,” Williams said. “From the educational perspective, it gets the students out there to develop their skills in the real-world setting that they’ll soon be working in, and it gives them a chance to give back to the community. From the community’s perspective, the students bring a lot of youthful enthusiasm and creativity that gives a community the political space to think outside the box.”

Burton said this kind of push forward is exactly what the city needs.

“Everybody talks about millennials, but we don’t have a lot of millennials at the city that can effect change,” he said. “We are going to have some very bright and young minds here. These are true millennials, but the best and brightest of them. That can be hard for some of us, but they are here to help us into the future. We are the present. Change is not easy, but this is the perfect time to bring in these young minds, when things are tipping between the new and old ways.”

The project is expected to be formally approved by the CRA board on Monday night.

A kick-off event involving city officials, USF staff and students is being planned for August.

A complete list of projects the student and faculty will help with is still being finalized.

This story was originally published May 31, 2016 at 5:31 PM with the headline "USF looks to partner with Palmetto to help move the city into the future."