Project Overview

Known as ‘The First City on the Mississippi’, Bemidji is a growing regional center situated 225 miles north of the Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area. The City population is approximately 16,000 with another 45,000 people within a 30-mile radius of the City. Primary economic drivers include healthcare, manufacturing, education, tourism, retail, and government. Home of the iconic Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox, the region’s parks and trails, lakes and forests attract visitors from around the world.

Future iQ has been contracted to facilitate the community-wide visioning effort, ‘Envision Bemidji 2030’. The objective of ‘Envision Bemidji 2030’ is to lead a broad-based effort to identify a common vision for the greater Bemidji region and encourage collective, sustained, strategic civic action toward that vision. Future iQ will work closely with the project’s Stewardship Team to guide project direction and oversee project activities. The Stewardship Team is made up of a broad cross-section of community members, businesses, nonprofits, and public organizations, and is committed to engaging with and listening carefully to all voices in the greater Bemidji community as it seeks to understand its shared prosperity and vision for the future.

The ‘Envision Bemidji 2030’ visioning process will last approximately 9 months and include extensive community engagement including a Think-Tank, visioning workshops, interviews, focus groups and a Future Summit. Careful emphasis will be placed on involving youth and as many community stakeholders as possible. The project will produce a Community Vision and Strategic Action Plan that will guide the regional community and area leadership for the next ten years.