Another Plan, Another Consultant, or Something Different?

The wait is over with the recent announcement that East-West Gateway and Greater St. Louis, Inc. are investing $1.3 million to create a regional vision and an alignment strategy.

On its face, it's hard to disagree with the premise. St. Louis needs population growth. We need stronger regional collaboration. We need alignment around workforce, economic development, infrastructure, and quality of life. Most reasonable people would agree on those goals.

But what's going to be different this time?

A lot of our members have been around this region long enough to remember a lot of studies, strategic plans, visioning exercises, task forces, and consultant-led initiatives. Many contained thoughtful recommendations. Many identified the same challenges we're discussing today. Yet here we are, once again talking about population decline, fragmented decision-making, competing priorities, and a lack of regional alignment.

To be fair, East-West Gateway acknowledges that history. In fact, part of this initiative appears to be an effort to learn from previous regional plans and avoid repeating the same mistakes. That's encouraging. But it also raises another question. If the organizations leading this effort have been central players in regional planning for decades, what has prevented implementation of the many good ideas that already exist?

This isn't criticism. It's curiosity.

The consultant chosen will undoubtedly gather stakeholders, facilitate conversations, identify priorities, and help create a framework. But consultants don't make decisions. Elected officials do. Institutions do. Organizations do. Boards do. And many of those same institutions are represented within the very governance structures that have shaped the region's trajectory to this point.

As a group that spends a great deal of time talking with business leaders, elected officials, nonprofit executives, and community stakeholders, no one senses a shortage of ideas—more so a sense of frustration with execution.

Perhaps the most important question isn't whether we can create a shared vision.

It's whether the people with the authority to act are prepared to make different choices once that vision is complete.

Progress 64 West genuinely hopes this effort succeeds. St. Louis needs momentum. We need growth. We need greater regional cooperation. But optimism alone isn't a strategy.

The measure of success won't be the quality of the report.

It will be whether five years from now we're pointing to measurable outcomes—or launching another study asking why the last one didn't work.