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Stand up and remake our community |
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Written by Administrator
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Friday, 23 January 2009 |
During his Inaugural address to the nation Tuesday, President Obama, said these words:
“Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and begin the work of remaking America.”
Today, as citizens across this country stare down the woes of our times, we all must do our share to remake our place in our world, our country and our communities. For this community, the message to remake our place now and the place for our future generations, is all too clear.
For too long, this community has tiptoed backward while the world around us leaped forward. We have failed to understand the challenges before us, even when someone clearly spelled out the answers. We have chosen to warm our palms on the stove of the neighbor, instead of building our own fires.
Once again, this community, its citizens, but most importantly, its leaders, have been presented with a plan to shape opportunity for future generations, to remake what has been undone by those who came before us. Now is not the time to fail our future once again.
Even if we do not acknowledge all that has been observed of us or recommended for us, we must work to change what we can change and what we are to become. We must forego our current way of thinking and doing and try something new, even if failure should follow, in order to remake tomorrow.
Our education system needs clearer lines drawn on the chalkboard. It’s not the teachers that change our students, it’s the community that demands more of those teachers and the system that supports them.
Our healthcare system needs its pulse checked. It’s not the medicine that makes us stronger, but the community that demands more from those that save our loved ones from peril.
Our infrastructure needs re-paving. But, its not so much the infrastructure we focus on now (roads, water and roads) as the infrastructure of the future; access to new technology, communications, recreation and quality of living fundamentals, that should have the blacktop poured to it.
Our leaders need to open their eyes, as well as their brains. It’s the whole of the community that matters, that needs guidance, that wants a different future. We should no longer let our leaders, and those that work under them, idle by only on the graces of a few of their closest allies.
We, the entire McCreary County community, can accept this new plan, or even make a new one, but whatever the process, it is time we move forward for the next generation. It is time we demand the most from governmental services: 911, ambulance, solid waste; it is time we demand more from those that educate those that will follow in our steps; it is time we demand a higher level of care for all who ail; it is time we demand more from ourselves, expect more of ourselves and devote more of ourselves to remake this corner of America.
Times are challenging for every community in this country. Times are never like they have been. Some say we live in a bubble here, never affected by what happens, good or bad, in the rest of this country. At some point, we must choose whether we want to run out of air and suffocate together inside that bubble or stand up, dust ourselves off and burst that bubble breathing fresh air, and ideas, as we remake our way in this world.
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