Description of Individual or organization
The Green Centerpiece Master Strategy Team is a group of Lewisville leaders who have developed a plan for cultivating and nurturing green space within its borders. For the last two years, the City of Lewisville (COL) has been hard at work planning the pathway to the city’s 100th birthday in 2025. City staff began working with community members and consultants in 2014 to develop a ten-year plan for Lewisville’s future. The result was the Lewisville 2025 Plan, which created the framework for making and keeping Lewisville a thriving and sustainable city.
The focus of this framework document is a series of Big Moves that reflect what community stakeholders determined to be our highest priorities over the next decade. The first of these Big Moves – Create a Green Centerpiece – indicates the community’s commitment to protecting natural open spaces and urban wilderness that already exist within our borders and advancing efforts to include additional green space in the city. As the name implies, the Green Centerpiece includes the central area of Lewisville that is bound by Lewisville Lake and the 1,900-acre Lewisville Lake Environmental Learning Area (LLELA) on the north, and then meanders with the Elm Fork of the Trinity River through the center of the city to include expanded areas in the undeveloped floodplain all the way to Lewisville's southern boundary. The area totals over 6,700 acres and encompasses almost 25% of the land within the city limits.
About the same time this long range planning process was going on for Lewisville, the primary asset located within the Green Centerpiece was experiencing some challenges. LLELA is a natural area situated just south of the Lewisville Lake dam on property owned by the U.S. Corps of Engineers (COE). It is truly the apex of the Green Centerpiece. Since its inception, LLELA had been funded by mitigation funds the COE directed to programs and projects undertaken on the property. Those programs included education, interactive outdoor activities, research projects, fish and wildlife management programs, and restoration. Mitigation funding was quickly coming to an end, and managing partners COE, University of North Texas (UNT), Lewisville Independent School District (LISD), and Texas A&M AgriLife Extension were challenged to sustain LLELA operations. The City of Lewisville had long served on the managing board of LLELA with the operating partners. Recognizing the amazing asset Lewisville had in LLELA, the City set in motion plans to create a unique partnership to ensure the success of LLELA and create Lewisville’s Green Centerpiece simultaneously. The Green Centerpiece Master Strategy Team (the Team) came to life.
Leadership (Nominee demonstrates leadership through example, knowledge, attitude)
A new partnership agreement was created that established the Team to develop the Green Centerpiece Master Strategy. The Team is comprised of executive staff of the City, COE, UNT and LISD, and the Team is assisted by various staff members throughout these organizations. These key operating partners began meeting regularly under the guidance of City consultant Strategic Community Solutions to explore the opportunity before them. The Team carefully put together a funding plan that would see LLELA through the short-term and provide stability for the future. The Master Strategy is not the work of any one individual or organization; it is the culmination of well blended efforts capitalizing on the diverse range of resources and expertise of each partner. Outcomes of this collaboration Include:
• COL integrated LLELA into its extensive parks and recreation system and took over operation of the educational and recreation programs including gate coverage, maintenance operations and educational staff.
• UNT maintained staffing to manage research and restoration programs, fast-paced curriculum development to bolster those programs, and committed additional funding to ongoing program and infrastructure development.
• The COE solidified its commitment to manage the surrounding area to benefit fish and wildlife and retain the habitat on which these species depend.
• LISD committed to contribution of resources for infrastructure and enhanced environmental education and research at LLELA, particularly looking toward benefits for its 52,000+ students who will be future stewards of the area’s natural assets.
• All partners envision a Nature Center to be the hub for the Green Centerpiece, and realizing the limitations of the Team to accomplish management of a Nature Center on its own, the Team has engaged Audubon Texas as an additional partner to pursue development of the Center.
The Team established guiding principles for all decision making and a detailed timeline for actions to be taken throughout implementation. The goal is that Lewisville’s Green Centerpiece initiatives serve as the basis for collaborations with other North Texas communities with similar initiatives and as the foundation of Lewisville’s regional leadership on environmental and sustainability issues.
Environmental Impact (Nominee demonstrates a positive impact on the local environment via policy change, product offering, significant volunteer contribution or other achievement)
The Green Centerpiece Master Strategy is designed to take advantage of the lake and its floodway to provide a natural open space and urban wilderness that can be a part of everyday life for Lewisville residents. However, uses, activities, and infrastructure within the Green Centerpiece and expanded area are well planned so their impacts will not exceed the carrying capacity of the natural systems present or threaten the vitality of the ecology in the area. Attention was given to using best practices that exemplify green infrastructure in terms of trail systems, public art, landscaping, drainage, mobility, and water protection.
The Master Strategy vision is for the Green Centerpiece to be not only a central feature of Lewisville’s identity, but an important contributor to environmental management best practices in the region and in Texas. The Team thoughtfully considered present day needs and future possibilities throughout the planning process. As a result, the Master Strategy not only addresses the Green Centerpiece, but also provides guidance for sustainable land use and development investment strategies in the expanded areas that lie south of LLELA. Including this expanded area in the Master Strategy ensures design standards, land uses, and public infrastructure strengthen the environmental assets already present. The Strategy also outlines future considerations to incorporate closure plans for the landfills in Lewisville that will create environmentally desirable wildlife management sites and park-like amenities at those locations.
Community Impact (Nominee demonstrates commitment to DFW green community through involvement with causes, business ventures or organizations)
Community has been at the core of 2025 planning process and the Green Centerpiece Master Strategy development since it all began. Citizen, business and volunteer participation ensured a comprehensive plan that seeks to achieve social equity, environmental stewardship, and fiscal responsibility. All players were in it for the benefit of the community, putting aside private agendas and individual preferences for the greater good. That spirit still prevails as all partners are moving forward with the action items identified in these planning processes.
Building on the strengths of partnerships that already exist at LLELA, the Team has relied heavily on volunteers for participation in implementation of the Master Strategy. An exceptional volunteer base has been active with educational and recreational programs for many years. Nonprofit Friends of LLELA, Master Gardeners, Master Naturalists, kayak groups, birders, and so many others have become a part of the fabric that makes the Green Centerpiece so notable. Their ideas and involvement have been very important to development of the Master Strategy, and the volunteers will continue to be significant to the implementation of the plan. Likewise, the addition of Audubon Texas as a partner for the Nature Center equips the Team with expertise and experience to secure Lewisville’s success with the Green Centerpiece.
Other reasons for your nomination
It is rare that organizations with such diverse organizational structures, operational capabilities, funding mechanisms, policy directions and constraints, and needs can come together so seamlessly to achieve harmony toward a common goal. It speaks to the worthiness of the goal of creating the Green Centerpiece that the key partners were able to accomplish a common vision. All members of the Team have come away from the meeting table with more than what they had when they first sat down at that table. The Team has provided exemplary leadership, foresight and commitment in developing this Master Strategy. As a result, Lewisville is well on its way to a remarkable celebration of achievements in 2025.
