Max Loves Midland is the culmination of years of planning and work through the Communities of Excellence 2026 program.

“Imagine a time when leaders within a community – official leaders (those elected or appointed to their formal positions) as well as the many informal community leaders – work together to set community vision; listen to community stakeholders to better understand community assets and needs; (re)allocate resources to address community issues or advance community initiatives.”
— Communities of Excellence 2026
 

OUR GOVERNANCE STRUCTURE

 

  • The Community Success Panel (founded in 2010) led the selection of Communities of Excellence, which uses the Baldrige framework. The goal is to drive Midland County to a higher level of overall community performance, where various community entities are all working together to deliver collective impact across the areas of health, education, the economy, and quality of life. The Community Success Panel sponsors the Communities of Excellence 2026 process.  

    The Community Success Panel’s purpose is to enhance prosperity in Midland County by gathering key stakeholders to envision our best future through sharing ideas, building productive relationships, and aligning economic development efforts.

    Inspired by a peer community assessment of Columbus, Indiana, in 2010, community leaders were brought together by a partnership of the Midland Area Chamber of Commerce, the City of Midland, and Midland Tomorrow to determine to what extent local institutions, each with a stake in the long-term success of Midland, were aligned in their individual efforts to expand economic opportunities and prosperity for all residents and businesses. 

    Participants come together in a spirit of collaboration to find commonality as they work to:

    - Develop a community-wide economic development plan, the cornerstone of a thriving community

    - Encourage alignment of the work conducted by each member organization with the community-wide plan

    - Seek and foster operational efficiencies and improvements among member organizations

    - Develop key indicators to measure and evaluate the impact of the initiative on the community’s prosperity and economic growth

    - Pursue funding options to assist with key initiatives and programs which support the initiative

  • The Max Loves Midland Steering Committee “does the work” of the Communities of Excellence process, working through the curriculum with national Communities of Excellence representatives via webinars and highly structured self-analysis. The Steering Committee also engages with other learning collaboratives where Communities of Excellence has been implemented successfully.

  • Collabor-action is collaborative action towards a specific goal. These teams meet quarterly to help create tangible change and improvement in our Midland County community.

    Current teams are:
    Childcare
    Housing
    People Talent & Retention

  • The Max Loves Midland Navigation Team is a cross section of the community. All voices are invited and welcomed.

    This group meets quarterly to receive updates on progress in topics important to help make Midland a place where everyone thrives. The group will hear from speakers and provide input that will help solve important issues our community is facing. Additionally, we ask that members take action - at the end of the meeting members learn ways they can play a part in community improvement.

    Learn more.

  • The Midland Communicators group exists to connect communicators for collaboration that supports the Midland County vision statement. We meet quarterly.

    Learn more.

  • Max Loves Midland is open to all 80k+ Midland County residents. You’re invited to join the Navigation Team, submit events, and interact with us on social media via Facebook and Instagram. Please contact us for more information. We hope to see you soon!

    Love, Max