9. The HRIBF Strategic Plan
(J. R. Beene)

At the last S&T review of the HRIBF facility and research program, held in November 2004, it was recommended that HRIBF develop a Strategic Plan for the facility and its research program. We had actually begun the development of such a plan a few months earlier and have continued to work on it since. The initial draft was put together by HRIBF management and staff. Extensive comments and suggestions from research staff members and members of the HRIBF Users Executive Committee have also been incorporated. The resulting draft plan was presented to and discussed with the HRIBF Scientific Policy Committee at its meeting on December 9 and 10, 2005; their insights and concerns have helped us to refine the Plan further.

The HRIBF Strategic Plan is intended to serve as a framework to guide the development of HRIBF and its science program and ensure that they are well aligned with the priorities of DOE-NP and the Office of Science. It is divided into three parallel but closely coupled parts, titled Science Opportunities, Experimental Systems, and Facility. The initial part of the Plan lists, in compact form, the overarching scientific goals we hope to achieve at HRIBF, and the corresponding goals for development of experimental hardware and accelerator systems required to enable the science goals. These strategic goals are followed by an "implementation plan" which lists a set of milestones in each of the three areas along a timeline running until 2013. The Science Opportunities, from which the elements in the other two areas derive, are coded to indicate their relationship to the DOE Nuclear Physics Program Milestones. At this point, we are still collecting input from the HRIBF user community and staff, as well as our advisory committees, so the Plan is still considered to be a draft. Even in the long term, however, we will regard this Plan as a living document which will undergo continuous modification to suit changing needs and circumstances.