CRANBERRY TWP — A handful of people offered ideas to improve the Pittsburgh region at a Power of 32 meeting here Monday evening.

Power of 32 is a project covering 32 counties in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio and Maryland aimed at creating a shared vision for the region's future.

Project leaders have scheduled four public sessions where they want to collect residents' views for the region's future. The second of those sessions was this one at the township municipal center.

Facilitator for the event was volunteer Cindy Chemsak, who divided the nine residents who attended into three groups.

She asked each group to discuss reasons for attending, challenges to becoming a thriving region, strengths of the region, the possibilities of the region and its future.

The group members came up with a list of challenges they thought could impede a bright regional future as well as a list of regional strengths.

Regional challenges

• A lack of connective transportation

• Residential decay in cities with an uneven distribution of wealth

• Inertia created by old-fashioned thinking

• Attracting business and development that would attract and retain educated residents

• Educational needs in public schools

Regional strengths

• Proactive local governments

• Real estate affordability

• Good location

• A comparatively low crime rate and few natural disasters

• A polite and friendly population

• Rivers and green/recreational spaces

• Educational resources that benefit people and businesses

• A hard-working labor force

Chemsak collected the ideas and said they would be forwarded to the leaders of the project in Pittsburgh, where they would be entered into a database.

"Your opinions are really very important right now," Chemsak said. "No ideas are going to be lost."

She said the current visioning stage of Power of 32 will be followed by the framing phase, then the prioritizing phase.

In 2011, the ideas chosen by the project's steering committee will be shared with the public through a series of town meetings.

"Everyone's perspective is valuable," said Chemsak of Elizabeth, Allegheny County.

The next public meetings will be at 8 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. on Aug. 25 at the Belmont Complex in East Franklin Township, Armstrong County. Anyone in the 32 counties can attend.

The public also can participate in Power of 32 by logging onto www.powerof32.org.