Common Good Award Luncheon 2019
Growth in Utah: A Challenge and an Opportunity

We'd like to extend a big thanks to everyone who made this year's Common Good Awards such a record-breaking success!

Utah is growing faster than any other state. That kind of growth is a good sign — it means life in Utah is good enough that people want to live here and our children want to stay. But that kind of growth also brings challenges that we feel on our roads, in our neighborhoods, on our trails, and in other aspects of our lives.

For the last quarter century, Utah has been the nation’s example in preparing for our growth — not just if we grow, but how we grow. Thank you for reflecting with us on what we’ve learned over the last 25 years and to look forward to what the next 25 years could bring!

Keynote Speaker

Robert J. Grow is founding chair and CEO of Envision Utah. Over two decades ago, Robert helped pioneer the Envision Utah process in which government, private organizations, nonprofits, and the public work together to understand local values, consider choices for the future, and ultimately create broadly supported, long-range plans to accommodate growth while improving quality of life.

Under Robert’s leadership, the initial Envision Utah effort led to a dramatic expansion of Utah’s public transportation system, reductions in per capita water use, reduced air pollution, reservation of farmland and open space, and better community design. Most importantly, it established a vision for what the future could be and outlined specific, collaborative strategies to realize that vision. Grow has since helped Replicate the same process for various geographies and diverse issues across Utah. He also led the recent Your Utah, Your Future effort—a statewide visioning project that gathered participation from more than 52,000 Utahns.

Outside of Utah, Robert has consulted, coached, and taught communities in more than 80 major metropolitan areas of the United States, helping them follow this same model for values-based visioning. He has also led the visioning teams for San Diego; Laie, Hawaii; and the 175,000-acre Superstition Vistas property in Arizona. Robert also played a significant role in the Southern Louisiana visioning processes after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. As an attorney back at home, he was part of the team that established Daybreak.

For his work, Robert has received a Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of Utah and national lifetime leadership award from Partners for Livable Communities. He has been recognized as Utah’s entrepreneur of the year among other national and local honors. He has melded his engineering and legal educations into a diverse career that has included practicing law, serving as president of a large manufacturing company, and chairing a national trade association. He also served on the Utah State Economic Development Board. Grow and his wife, Linda, have six children and 26 grandchildren.