This is an important year for three local entities currently undergoing or preparing for planning for facilities.

Powell Valley Healthcare is in the middle of the process of creating a new master facilities plan that will map out options and priorities for updating and expanding hospital departments, filling in the basement and second floor of the Powell Valley Clinic building and updating other buildings on the PVHC campus.

This process is of critical importance for Powell Valley Healthcare, which must update and expand hospital and clinic facilities to continue to meet the community’s healthcare needs and poise the organization for the future.

A public presentation tonight (Thursday) by Davis Partnership Architects will provide insights and options regarding the process and possible future outcomes for PVHC facilities. The meeting begins at 5 p.m. in the Sun Room at Powell Valley Hospital.

Meanwhile, Northwest College is nearing the end of the planning stage for the new Yellowstone Academic and Workforce Training Building. Once plans for the new classroom building are complete, the project will go up for bid, tentatively in April, and construction is expected to begin in June.

NWC leaders also are preparing to begin an update of the college’s master facilities plan, which will guide the administration, the board and the campus community as they plan and make decisions to meet facility needs in the future.

Kim Mills, NWC vice president for administrative services, told the board late last year that the plan is especially important now for several reasons. First, the facilities master plan must be updated in order for the college to qualify for any state funding for facilities.

In addition, the plan will guide college leaders as they decide how to best use space that will be freed up in other buildings when departments and offices move to the new Yellowstone building next year.

The planning process will be key to consolidating college departments and services and making sure the space is used wisely.

Park County is in the early stages of planning for a new building at the Park County Fairgrounds to replace the Large Exhibit Hall, which was torn down in 2011 after architects determined it was unsafe, and other outdated exhibit hall buildings.

Preliminary ideas for that building call for a dividable space that will seat a large number of people for public meetings and events in addition to meeting space needs during the annual Park County Fair.

The county has submitted several grant applications for the building and continues to look for additional sources of funding to move the planned project forward.

All three projects are important, not only to the entities doing the planning, but to their abilities to serve the public — in Powell, in Park County and beyond — well into the future. Therefore, it is appropriate and desirable for members of the public to provide their ideas and visions for facilities plans during the current and pending processes.