Goals

Common Pathways creates shared learning by diverse residents and key institutional stakeholders on vital issues of the day, as identified by indicators. This process will:

• Promote effective citizen and organizational discourse leading to informed action using an array of civic forums, formats, and events
• Facilitate broad-based resident/organizational representation in identifying a common set of community indicators
• Proactively assure access to participation in the local democratic process for diverse groups and individuals
• Build the relationships and connections essential to its role as a catalyst for positive change
• Produce a platform that is neutral, hosted, and facilitated with integrity, and that advances/models the Healthy Communities Principles
• Celebrate effective community actors/actions and promote best practices and effective models

Common Pathways creates a consensus set of community indicators and benchmarks that:

• Serve as a central repository of credible and timely measures of community health and quality of life
• Present data at the regional, municipal, and neighborhood levels (as available) with baselines and benchmarks
• Make available highly visible, widely shared, easily understood, and broadly used markers via hard copy and on the world wide web
• Broaden the resident base of decision makers regarding what data is accessible, gathered, and examined
• Encourage partners to set goals, surface emergent issues, track trends, and communicate implications
• Facilitate strategic planning, resource allocation, and evidence based decision making in the community
• Support shared responsibility and “performance compacts” with community entities