Strong interest in Community is apparent

The other day in the Writing for the Media course I am teaching at Coker this semester, I was talking about the need most of us have to 'Know what is going on.' The authors of the ELEMENTS OF JOURNALISM call this the "awareness instinct." The attention I felt this morning talking with United Methodist Men from three local churches seemed to underline that instinct. There appears to be a strong interest among people to know what is going on in their communities and what they might be able to do to help make them better. (As a sidelight here. I was asked to talk about the Selling Hartsville initiative and now am wishing that I had used this opportunity as a way to listen instead of talk because the short responses demonstrated a wealth of information that could be mined from these active Methodist Men.)

One of the things we did with the experience this morning was share the visitor questionnaire that is part of the Selling Hartsville initiative. It is often fun to see how Hartsvillians answer questions like, Please share your impressions of the Hartsville community. Here are some of their answers, which mirror a lot of what we get from visitors:
** Beautiful ** Great Place to Live ** Small town, everyone knows everyone.
** Rebuilding roads and growing ** Great little city ** well kept
** there seems to be some concern about drugs, gangs and crime
** lots of energetic people ** great facilities ** a good small town
** cohesive, needs to take advantage of available funds to improve outside downtown
** good ** a unique city,a remarkable mix of cultural and family oriented activities
** a sharing town -- good support of charity and community outreach
** Need increased emphasis in educational improvement
** need support and uplift of those with limited income
** a genuine small town atmosphere with a sense of community and cultural events
** good ** If schools improve, the community will grow ** my town for 60 years
** community is disconnected, particularly the pastors and churches
** Progressive city ** progressive, proactive, leader in the Pee Dee
** community oriented, friendly, a lot of cultural opportunities
** why do downtown businesses close so early on Saturday?
** It's great!** Big main street * diverse community as compared to other area towns
** Hartsville is a city that has the potential to be the greatest city in the state but is letting a few issues hold us back. Overall is very good but we could be great
** where is the new industry and the business growth ** ...efficient
**comfortable with people and leaders **great place to live and raise a family
** friendly with a lot of involvement ** viable downtown, community, clean
** dynamic in terms of lots to offer ** Hartsville has good community
** Hartsville has a wonderful community.

I think you can see from these responses that this would have been a great group to get more in depth input from on the question, "How can we make Hartsville an even greater community?"

The message to this group has been the message I have been sharing for several months. If we want Hartsville to be Hartsville or even better in five, ten or 20 years we need not be so complacent and find ways to make sure we impact how things are and how things will be. I did use the idea of "Que Sera, Sera"(sp?) 'What will be will be' and suggest that What will be is what we make it. If lots of us focus on continuing to make this a great community we might surprise ourselves as to what will be.