Community Building and Psychic Income

On an almost daily basis I am amazed at the intelligence, creativity, energy, zeal, and time people from nearly every walk of life are putting in to make Hartsville an even better place to live, work and raise a family. Some are doing these things because they are part of their jobs -- and in most cases the real compensation for the extra they are putting into the community-building aspect of these jobs is only covered under psychic income.

Public officials in Hartsville get paid but their pay is not substantial in most cases and in nearly all cases they would be compensated much more richly were they putting their efforts into earning money.

Community volunteers are getting no financial compensation at all for what they do.  I work for a board of trustees at The Byerly Foundation who all have joined the Board to contribute to making this community one of the best in the world. They get no financial compensation. In the world of Foundations, many private foundation boards do earn money for their service.

City staff do get paid for their efforts. In some cases the pay is adequate and in some cases the pay is way low for city-value received yet we have some of the best "public servants" in Hartsville that you will find in government work around this country.  Many of the people I am thinking of almost never turn off their availability to helping meet our city's challenges.  Just had a conversation with one of those city people earlier this week and she was already planning her weekend around making significant headway on one of her city projects. No overtime involved in that decision; just a dedicated community builder.

I am glad we have people who will work for the psychic income their roles provide because we would not be able to afford them at market rates that people of their caliber bring in the corporate or business world.

My guess is that all of us know people who are dedicating a great deal of their time to making things better in our city, in our schools, with our children, in our public spaces, in our public places -- you would be amazed at how much a quick thank you would add to their life satisfaction. And, even without the thank you they are going to "keep on, keeping on."

Psychic income is often very valuable personal compensation.