First-Year Retreat Brings Together Mayors & UCHRA

The Upper Cumberland’s city and county mayors made a two day retreat to Granville to work on planning for the future together.

UCHRA Executive Director Mark Farley led the retreat. He said the mayors worked on strategic planning and what types of programs UCHRA could implement. Farley said he and the mayors discussed the next steps to improve the Upper Cumberland and grow the area.

“How they take that next step, how do they grow into a different, larger municipality,” Farley said. “How to add staff, maybe some things they need to look at implementing and letting several of them talk about it together and see if they want to do it collectively.”

Farley said the mayor’s were split up over the two days, between city and county. Farley said based on the conversations during the retreat, the issues county and city mayors are facing are very different.

With UCHRA’s different programs, Farley said the organization could assist local leaders with their goals.

“The way we’re created we have the flexibility to serve what our region needs,” Farley said. “My hope is that coming out of this, that if there are needs that several of the communities need, if we’re able to fill that void we’ve done our job.”

This was the first year for the Mayor’s Retreat in the Upper Cumberland.