Transcending Community Acceptance to Achieve Social Progress through Effective Development of a Community-Focused Long Term Control Plan

The City of Omaha initiated development of a Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) Long Term Control Plan (LTCP), which required public involvement for a successful program. The combined sewer system area was divided into 10 basins for evaluation. With these 10 basins and seven Basin Consultants analyzing alternatives, the Program Management Team initiated a detailed decision process involving community input to maintain continuity for engaging the public in the alternative selection process. The integrated decision process approach involved groups of individuals from the public to serve on advisory panels for each of the 10 basins and one group to serve as a program-wide advisory panel. These advisory groups identified key criteria and associated weights for the criteria for selection of alternatives through public workshops and meetings from October 2006 through June 2007. With this integrated approach, alternatives identified at the basin level were effectively compiled into the system-wide LTCP.