Consider your strategy In order to determine how you want to involve different people, associations, institutions, and businesses in your community in your playspace planning, you should first consider the goals for your project. These are the fundamental questions you should seek to answer through Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD): Who are we?
How do you define your community? What geographical limits will you place (if any) on your asset mapping and identification? Will you limit yourself to the 10 blocks surrounding your potential playspace, or will you include your whole town? What do we want? How do we get it?
Consult with the chairs of your planning teams to determine what your actual project needs are. What do we have?
The ABCD planning process helps you answer this exact question!
Decide on a process/strategy
 Identifying community assets begins with creative group brainstorming, so one of the best strategies for planning community involvement with your project is to start with a community-wide kick-off meeting. At KaBOOM!, we recommend incorporating some ABCD thinking and planning into your community playspace Design Day. One way to identify assets is to pass out a written survey to individuals. Or you could choose a more informal process of orally collecting community success stories, or interviewing individuals, to solicit the same kind of information.  PDFDownload a sample individual capacity survey
A different way (although much more passive, and therefore less fruitful) of identifying assets can be to designate a public bulletin board where people can post notes under various categories for what they are offering or requesting. Categories can be pre-set by your committee, or can be determined after notices have been posted. Who will oversee the brainstorming session and asset identification process for your community? Your facilitator should be a warm, friendly person with whom others feel comfortable. Experience with ABCD isn't necessary, but experience facilitating brainstorming sessions is helpful. To think about your community most broadly, be sure to involve as many people as you can in your process. If you plan to incorporate ABCD into your Design Day, for example, be sure to invite a broad spectrum of folks other than parents and staff. Consider forming an ABCD sub-committee and having them tap into their own personal networks and invite friends and colleagues to get involved. Timing is an important consideration. You'll want to tap into, and build upon, your community's assets throughout your entire playspace planning project. Schedule your ABCD kick-off early enough in your process so that you'll have ample time to make asks, follow up and leverage resources.
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