At their meeting on April 24 the Palm Desert City Council unanimously approved the selection of a consultant team led by Raimi + Associates with Sargent Town Planning to assist the City in updating their General Plan, and in preparing Highway 111 Corridor Plan for the Palm Desert segment of the historic Grapefruit Highway. Raimi + Associates - a Berkeley-based planning firm with whom Sargent Town Planning share offices in Los Angeles and Berkeley- specializes in preparing general plans, with an strong focus on community health, sustainable neighborhoods, and social equity.

Sargent Town Planning will support the general plan update effort with urban analysis, design concepts, visualizations and recommendations. STP will lead the preparation of a community-based vision plan and new development standards and guidelines for the Highway 111 Corridor, focusing on strategies for better integrating it with adjoining neighborhoods and with the remarkable El Paseo shopping district just one block to the south.

David Sargent was the project manager for the BLVD Transformation while a senior associate of Moule & Polyzoides.

The work began in 2005 when the City retained David Sargent to help them understand why new development seemed out of place, not reinforcing the existing and desired small town character. David and his town planning team at HDR prepared a vision plan and interim design guidelines, and recommended that the City's general plan be updated to reflect that clarified vision. In 2007 the City's retained Moule & Polyzoides - with whom Mr. Sargent was at that time a senior associate - to update of the general plan. The general plan update was led by senior associates Tony Perez and David Sargent.