Our Vision

Creating a Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy for an area requires a thorough understanding of factors that have determined our past and present, and how existing resources can be used to shape our community’s future. During the Winter and Spring of 2003, the Future Forward Leadership Committee, representing 12 counties of the western Piedmont and Blue Ridge High Country of North Carolina, talked with their neighbors, friends, and colleagues to determine what we would all like to see happen to make this part of North Carolina more economically prosperous.

From that effort, the Future Forward Leadership Committee has crafted, with significant input from community leaders and organizations, a vision for the future of this area that will achieve:

• Skilled People
• Innovative Firms
• Economic Diversity
• Cool Places
• Smart Governance