WILLARD, Mo. The city of Willard is looking ahead to make the city a better place for future generations.

An open house Thursday night let the public weigh in on the city’s comprehensive plan that will span the next two decades.

There are quite a few topics the comprehensive plan covers, but the two biggest ones are economic development and land usage.

“Tonight is really us taking this culmination of work that we’ve been doing in the past 6 months to the public, and saying, did we get it right,” said Brandon Jenson, planner of the Southwest Missouri Council of Governments.

Jenson said they came up with three goals for each category, “we’ll ask citizens to rank their highest priority, what the city should really try and tackle first, then we also have photo booths and fun activities for kids.”

“Willard did its last comprehensive plan in 1991, and that had some work done in 94 and 99,” said Brad Gray, city administrator of Willard, “and so it was time to update the comprehensive plan, a lot of things have changed in the last 20 years.”

Gray grew up in Willard.

“I look at it a lot through my son’s eyes,” Gray said, “my son is a year old this week, so I think about what Willard’s going to look like when he graduates high school, and so we’re really excited about the things that we’re putting in place.”

The comprehensive plan covers a few topics, and the two biggest ones are economic development and land usage.

“Focusing on sustainability, expanding city limits to accommodate future growth and development that’s something they’re very interested in doing,” said Krista Evans, assistant professor of planning at Missouri State University.

Evans explained the goals in land usage and economic development, “developing the downtown core, which is a little under utilized at this point, there could be a lot of expansion down there, there’s a lot of possibilities in the downtown area.”

After citizens give their opinions, there will be a week-long public comment period.

“So the draft will be available at city hall and on the city’s website, we’ll receive comments and then we’ll have a week to make revisions before it goes to the planning and zoning commission, they’re the group that formally adopted this plan for the city,” explained Jenson, “and then it goes into effect.”

If you missed tonight’s meeting, you can still look at the plan and give your opinions online here.