STOCKTON - How much open space and farmland should be left in San Joaquin County in 2050, when the population is expected to triple to 1.7 million?

What kinds of development should be built to house that growth?

What options should county residents have to get from their homes to their jobs?

San Joaquin County residents from Tracy to Lockeford will have the chance to answer these and other questions in their hometowns during a series of workshops planned over the next month to help craft a vision of the future of the county and its neighbors as it enters the second half of the century.

"It's a long-term, regional vision for projected growth to 2050," said Anthony Zepeda, describing the San Joaquin Valley Blueprint process, of which the workshops are a part. He's an associate regional planner for the San Joaquin Council of Governments.

In earlier workshops and polls, county residents also listed air quality, job development and traffic congestion as top concerns of the future in the county.

At the workshops, residents will look at four different scenarios of what the county might look like in the next 40 years. Results will be added to three years' worth of meetings, polls and data collecting, then go before the council's governing board later this year.

The final product will be growth strategies for the county and the rest of the eight counties in the San Joaquin Valley.

It's designed to give local elected leaders another tool when making land-use decisions, without replacing local agencies' authority.

But having a blueprint in place will make the county more competitive when it comes to bringing in state and federal dollars, said David Hosley, president of the Great Valley Center, a Modesto-based nonprofit group that will play a role in bringing together the eight blueprints.

"It's the people who are sitting this one out, or are not doing that well, who are going to pay a penalty for not making this a priority," he said.

And the trans-Valley partnership can lead to the region developing political clout when competing with the population centers of the Bay Area and Southern California.

"It's an important first step of the Central Valley of being able to speak with one voice," Hosley said.

Contact reporter Zachary K. Johnson at (209) 546-8258 or zjohnson@recordnet.com.

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