APA Chapter

At the 2022 Montana Association Planners Conference in Billings, MAP will begin our campaign to become an official Chapter of the American Planning Association. This campaign will require collecting signatures from 100 members of the American Planning Association who live in Montana.

The MAP Board of Directors began looking into the potential of forming a full Montana Chapter of the American Planning Association several years ago during our strategic planning retreat. We held discussions with our membership, evaluated the pros and cons, and made an announcement at our last conference regarding our intention to move forward with that chapter formation.

While this might mean some logistical differences for MAP members, it will not affect our priorities, responsiveness, conference, or other ways we support our membership throughout the state. What it does mean is that we will have access to more resources through APA, and a simplified fee structure for Montana planners. Those of you who are both WCC and MAP members would now only have one membership fee to pay. 

The Board of Directors has spent a considerable amount of time weighing our options and given our current challenges in Montana we feel this is the best foot forward. In addition to the resources provided by APA, we believe it will ultimately increase our capacity and simplify the behind-the-scenes work we do to run a professional organization.

Benefits:

• Simplified membership for Montana planners
• Direct access to APA resources such as legislative support and conference credit reporting
• Elevation of Montana planning issues at the national level – we are at the forefront of many issues, and will be able to more directly convey those to APA leadership
• Access to additional technical resources to support planners in Montana
• Continued ability to set our own strategic goals and priorities as a local chapter – we will continue to be led by Montana planners through our existing board structure

If you are a registered member of the APA and reside in the state of Montana, you are eligible to vote. Please select the form above and submit it via email to the MAP Board President at [email protected] or [email protected].