Planning Councils Support Cross-Agency Communication

One member of the Agency Planning Council (APC) attends each regional and department planning council meetings, as one means of cross-agency communication. Planning council members are encouraged to exchange information and ask questions during these meetings. Responses to comments and questions of broad interest are provided in The Connection to support communication across the entire agency. 



This week’s question is: Can you remind me of the purpose of our agency’s planning councils?

Our agency’s planning councils are representative structures intended to improve communication, planning and learning. A few of the key functions of the planning councils include coordination of joint learning among team members and members of local schools, integration of services throughout the Agency and coordination of service plan implementation. Our planning council structure is also intended to build members’ leadership skills, allow for flexible and responsive decision-making, increase capacity to improve outcomes for kids, increase democratic decision-making and engage all staff. Each member of the organization can participate directly or indirectly through representation in decision-making through planning councils.

For regional planning councils, membership rotates to allow for many staff members to serve on their councils. The regional planning councils have diverse representation across job-alike and district service teams. Department planning councils are typically comprised of all members of a department’s staff.

A visual representation of our planning council structure, which includes members of APC, LLPC and SSPC is available in the below reference document.


Planning Council Structure & Membership Chart