City of Sunny Isles Beach Official Website
By George “Bud” Scholl, Mayor
(Friday, April 29, 2017) – Since the formation of the City of Sunny Isles Beach almost 20 years ago, a lot of thought has gone into providing events and activities for our residents and guests. Our ability to predict what our community is looking for has been a constant learning process over the years. Te one question that has become abundantly clear is, “How can we make our community become stronger and more vibrant through culture and the arts?” Put another way is, “How do we infuse culture and arts into our community for the benefit of all who live and visit us?” After considerable thought by many of our residents, former and current elected officials and other interested parties, the idea of cultural planning came about.
What we recognized was that there were experts that were familiar with the best practices from communities around the world. These experts could initiate a community wide planning process, make recommendations, and provide guidance for us to bring some proven and new ideas for cultural events and activities within our community. We are now calling this the Cultural Master Plan for Sunny Isles Beach.
Working in tandem with the Sunny Isles Beach Foundation, last fall we issued a request for proposals (RFP) from some of the top cultural planning organizations in the world. We evaluated those proposals, ranked them and ultimately chose a world class cultural planning firm. Our goal is to initiate a cultural planning process to assess our current and future community demographics, desires, and culture to create a Cultural Master Plan. In the end, our plan should act as a mirror for our community, ultimately and ideally, creating a refection of our community’s culture that we are serving.
Tis is an exciting step forward for our community. Te planning process has started and we are working with the Sunny Isles Beach Foundation, our consulting firm and, most importantly, our community to craft and implement the first Cultural Master Plan of Sunny Isles Beach. Be on the lookout for exciting new activities and events!