Annual Town Meeting

The City of Forest Grove invites you to think back 20 years.  How much has your lives changed?  Change is the topic of the City’s Annual Town Meeting on Saturday, January 26, 2008, at the Community Auditorium, from 9 to noon.   All audience members are invited to share their answer to the question:  What do you think are the biggest challenges and opportunities facing Forest Grove in the future?

After the “State of the City” address and Council introductions, several residents will share their perspectives on how Forest Grove has changed over the past 20 years.  Speakers will include Wink Weber, Mark Nakajima and David Morelli.  Then John White, a member of the Vision Update Committee, will present the new vision statement followed by Community Development Director, Jon Holan, who will present future trends expected over the next 20 years.  The bulk of the meeting will be spent in a community discussion of the biggest challenges and opportunities facing Forest Gove over the next 20 years.

Looking back over the past 20 years, many people note that the biggest change in Forest Grove is that more people live here.  In 1987 approximately 12,000 people called Forest Grove “home”.  It took nearly 100 years for the city to grow to 10,000 people – a population milestone reached in 1978.  But it only took 28 years for the City to double in size and reach 20,000 in 2005.  Right now, the population experts at Portland State University estimate that the City has 20,775 residents.  What will be the City’s population in 2030?

Metro’s number crunchers suggest that the City will be at 27,445 by 2030.  So far, Metro’s numbers have been pretty close to what has actually happened.  This means that about 7,500 more people will move into or be born in Forest Grove in the next twenty-some years.  These numbers present both challenges and opportunities.