In an increasingly digital world, La’asianée Brown was looking for a more tangible way to connect with her city government.
Thursday’s launch of Loveland 101 — a new civic education series designed to pull back the curtain on municipal operations — offered exactly that.
“It was informative,” said Brown, who has lived in Loveland since 2022. “…And it’s nice to be in person and actually see other people, and vice versa. I like that the community can see me as well.”
Brown was one of 25 residents who gathered in City Council chambers for the inaugural session of the five-part series, designed to give participants a clearer understanding of how local government works, from budgeting and development to public safety and long-term planning.
For Mayor Pat McFall, who welcomed participants on Thursday, the importance of an engaged and informed community cannot be overstated.
“To really learn about and get a better understanding of your city not only makes you better residents, but it also helps you explain to your friends and your family why things happen, so we can take some of the confusion out of what’s going on,” he said.
The first step in allaying that confusion came in the form of a panel discussion with the city’s top three executives — City Manager Jim Thompson and his deputies Rod Wensing and Brian Waldes. In a question and answer format, the three outlined the challenges of managing a growing municipality with 40 separate divisions and more than 1,000 employees.
“It’s very complex — it’s everything from an airport to a cemetery to everything in between,” said Thompson. “We’re a full-service city and we offer a lot more than some other cities do.”
But that complexity, he said, should not obscure the city’s responsibility to be transparent with residents — particularly when it comes to how decisions are made, how priorities are set and how taxpayer dollars are spent. That includes explaining the trade-offs behind those decisions, particularly when not every need or request can be met.
“We really want to do what you all want us to do,” the city manager said.
That’s not as easy as it sounds, especially when there are a multitude of competing priorities and only so many resources to go around, Thompson, Waldes and Wensing emphasized.
“The pie is only so big and you have to slice it the best you can,” Thompson said.
If the first half of the program focused on how those decisions are made, the second half turned to how residents feel about them.
Nicole Yost, the city’s communications and engagement director, presented results from Loveland’s 2024 National Community Survey, which measures resident sentiment across a range of areas and provides benchmarking that allows the city to compare itself with communities nationwide.
Among the findings, about eight in 10 residents rated Loveland as a good or excellent place to live, and most said they plan to remain in the city over the next five years, Yost told participants.
At the same time, the survey highlighted areas of concern, including affordability and the local economy, underscoring the same tensions discussed earlier in the evening.
To bring those results to life, Yost and her team led participants through a “dot activity” that asked them to rate city services and community conditions, then compared their responses to the 2024 survey results.
The Loveland 101 series will continue over the next four Thursdays, with sessions focused on topics including public safety, placemaking and infrastructure.
For Brown, the opening session was a useful starting point — but not the end of the conversation.
“I’m curious to see how in depth they will actually go,” she said.
