The year's Northern New England Chapter of the American Planning Association (NNECAPA) Conference will be held on Nov. 13 – 15 at the Mount Washington Resort in Bretton Woods. The theme, "Live. Work. Play." will be carried through in the various sessions planned for the conference.

Strafford Regional Planning Commission (SRPC) staffers will be leading two of the sessions at the conference, presenting on work/life balance, and on a grassroots tourism initiative and the role of social media.

Shayna Sylvia, communications and outreach planner will be joining Wentworth Economic Development Corporation Executive Director Denise Roy Palmer and Explore Moose Mountains consultant Barbara Wilson for a talk titled "“The Moose: How one fledgling non-profit initiative took seven small towns into two million Facebook feeds.” Explore Moose Mountains (EMM), or The Moose, NH, is a grassroots, non-profit initiative to promote the WONDERFUL in the towns of Brookfield, Farmington, Milton, Middleton, New Durham, Wakefield and Wolfeboro. It’s parent entity, Wentworth Economic Development Corporation, is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) regional economic development corporation founded in 1993 for the sole purpose of promoting economic growth in the eastern Lakes Region.
Shayna, Barbara and Denise will be providing an overview on how the EMM initiative began, with assistance from SRPC, in 2014, and the role social media, primarily Facebook, has played in publicizing the effort.

Senior Planner James Burdin will also be presenting at the conference with Sarah Marchant, City of Nashua; Carol Eyerman, Town of Topsham, Maine; and Donna Benton, City of Dover. They will lead a session on work/life balance for planners, discussing topics such as adapting to parenthood as a working planner, acting as a caregiver to an aging relative, coping with evening meetings, and/or volunteering in your community without "burning out."

Learn more about the NNECAPA conference, or register , online.