Background

All Together Flower Mound is an initiative that began in early 2021 to provide an opportunity for an informal group of community members from different backgrounds and cultures to think of ideas and solutions to make Flower Mound better, while also increasing engagement and participation with the Town.

Focus Group Meetings

Over eight focus group meetings that included a total of 51 individuals, participants shared their life experiences in Flower Mound and listened to others' experiences, with the purpose of thinking of ideas and solutions to make the community better. The Town Manager, Police Chief, and two Council members were also part of the focus groups to listen and answer any questions.

The meetings took place between March 25, 2021 and May 18,  2021 at the Flower Mound Senior Center, with COVID-19 precautions in place. The focus groups weren't televised and no formal minutes were taken in order for participants to feel comfortable discussing important and sensitive topics. Each focus group was limited to 10 attendees each (not counting staff and Council members).

Each meeting agenda emphasized listening and sharing. Discussion of thoughts and ideas centered around the following questions:  

  • What programs and events can we add, or add to, that increase engagement and listening?
  • How do we make sure all residents are comfortable with participating and engaging with the Town?
  • How do we assure all residents that the Town is listening?
  • How do we ensure that hate crimes have no home here?

Focus Group Next Steps

We heard a lot from our All Together Flower Mound focus groups, and we grouped those ideas and comments into seven categories.

Boards and Commissions

  • What we heard: 
    • Representation is important
    • Highlight the diversity of the Boards and Commissions
  • What we are doing:
    • Taking photos of all board members, and placing those photos on each board's webpage

Economic Development

  • What we heard:
    • Make sure all feel welcome
    • Marketing materials should highlight diversity of the Town
  • What we are doing:
    • Including more demographic information in Town materials
    • Including photos that reflect the diversity within our community

Communications

  • What we heard: 
    • Use message boards for upcoming meetings, etc., and not just for events
    • Highlight cultural events and other activities happening in the community
    • Include photos on Town website that reflect the diversity within our community
    • Work with HOAs to increase communication about Town activities, meetings and events
    • Make the Town's welcome packet available to renters and not just those signing up for utility accounts (find a better delivery method)
    • Provide education on cultural differences and diversity
  • What we are doing:
    • Increasing usage of message boards for work sessions or special meetings
    • Determining ways to highlight non-Town events
      • Potentially utilizing an online community event board 
      • Potentially including more information in monthly mayor's messaging and/or videos
    • Ensuring website and social media photos reflect the diversity within our community
    • Called each HOA representative to ensure they're signed up for the Town's notification systems and encouraged those representatives to pass along those notifications to their members
    • Promoting the Town's notification systems more regularly on social media, in our monthly E-Town, in utility bill inserts, in our welcome packet, and on FMTV
    • Revamped the welcome packet and made it available online
    • Highlighting cultural heritage months (using the U.S. Courts' designated commemorative observances months), including history and background information online
    • Providing resource information on Town website with related links on the All Together Flower Mound webpage

Elected Officials

  • What we heard:
    • Need more engagement with the community outside of Town Council meetings
  • What we're doing:
    • Encouraging Council members to attend more community events, such as:
      • National Night Out
      • Festivals
      • Community events not sponsored by the Town

Parks and Recreation

  • What we heard:
    • Create a cultural festival event that provides an opportunity to learn about other cultures and meet members of the community
    • Host more specific cultural events
  • What we are doing:
    • Creating a Celebrating Cultures festival - a new festival that celebrates and highlights many different cultures
    • Enhancing and growing our Holi Festival in March and Diwali Festival in October
      • Budget decision packages have been submitted for all three events

Library

  • What we heard:
    • Host more educational events
    • Create Living Libraries
  • What we are doing:
    • Creating specific programming and highlighting collections to coincide with various heritage months
    • Establishing Living Libraries - hosting approximately six speaker events to provide information about various cultures
      • Budget decision package has been submitted for Living Libraries program

Police

  • What we heard:
    • Update the Neighborhood Watch information and program
    • Increase promotion of and expand the National Night Out program
  • What we are doing:
    • Updated the Neighborhood Watch webpage to provide additional information
    • Increasing promotion of National Night Out via website, social media, notification systems, FMTV, and other outlets
    • Potentially adding a central location for National Night Out for neighborhoods without HOAs