WHAT: Northeast Oklahoma Regional Summit
WHERE: Rogers State University, Centennial Center
WHEN: 8 a.m. – 5 p.m., Oct. 13, 2011
REGISTRATION COST: $50
The third annual Northeast Oklahoma Regional Summit will take place on Oct. 13 at the Rogers State University Centennial Center, 1701 W. Will Rogers Blvd. in Claremore.
The summit will focus on growing a 14-county region in northeastern Oklahoma, encompassing Adair, Cherokee, Craig, Delaware, Mayes, McIntosh, Muskogee, Nowata, Okmulgee, Ottawa, Rogers, Sequoyah, Wagoner, and Washington counties. Its estimated population is more than 600,000.
The goal of the Summit is to engage community leaders in implementing a regional plan aimed at improving the competitiveness and strengthening the long-term economic well-being of the region. Issues such as workforce development, education, infrastructure, and business expansion are a few of the areas addressed in the regional plan.
For the past two years, community leaders and concerned citizens have joined in the effort to collaborate and promote northeast Oklahoma as a unified region.
“Through this collaborative effort our rural communities will find potential for shared resources and expertise as well as give us a unified voice on legislative issues affecting the region,” said Anna Knight with Cherokee Nation Commerce.
Work on the broad-based regional plan began in 2009 and was finalized at the 2010 summit. During the past year, RSU merged its regional stewardship efforts with the northeastern Oklahoma regional collaborative.
“Collaboration of regional planning efforts at Rogers State University and Northeastern State University has already created opportunities to leverage institutional resources,” said Dr. Ray Brown, vice president for economic and community development at RSU. “We are accomplishing much more together than we could separately.”
The summit is open to anyone who self-identifies as a leader in their community, business, church, school or otherwise, and who has an interest in improving the regional economy and well-being of the area.
A full agenda and registration information are available online at http://www.neokregion.org.