Foundations of community health: Planning access to public facilities

Abstract

While shared use agreement strategies help provide community access to public facilities, the application of this strategy is often an afterthought to commu- nity planning and thus, community health. Alternatively, an emerging trend in com- munity health sets an appropriate stage to address community needs by establishing a framework in which various stakeholders build a shared use policy strategy in land use from the onset of development. The application of collaborative community planning as a fundamental component of community health is demonstrated in four case examples from Australia, Canada, and the United States. The qualitative com- parative results in the case studies suggest that the partnership framework offers an opportunity to achieve improved community health outcomes. Cumulatively, analy- sis of a limited number of available shared use performance indicators demonstrates an important need for the development of measurable metrics, reporting, and track- ing in which data sharing becomes a necessary element of policy.