The Conde Civic Development will meet Thursday, April 30 at the Conde Community Center beginning at 6pm with a potluck supper. Many important projects and activities will be planned and discussed. It is also time to start thinking of and planning for our 125th birthday celebration to be held in the year 2011. All new members are encouraged to join this group to keep the community spirit alive.
The Horizons II program may be winding down but that hasn’t stopped the momentum here in Conde. A successful breadbaking and bead bracelet workshop was held Monday, June 19th with several youngsters taking home a loaf of homemade bread and many enjoying the art of making bead bracelets and necklaces. We are still working with the Conde City on improvements to the city park. Several women gathered in the evenings to donate time and talent to do some painting there and we hope that the new slide is installed soon. Our hardworking group with the help of others, have planned and prepared an area for the delivery of our stone welcome sign. We hope to have this project completed in time for guests coming to town for the Conde High All-school reunion. Another workshop is to be help on the 23rd for beginning wordworking and sewing. We will soon be planning for our graduation and an August “Fall Festival”. We hope to keep up the enthusiasm and inspire more citizens to join in the fun!!
Congratulations to Edith and the rest of the planning crew for organizing a successful clean-up day, we had some great volunteers. It is very inspiring to see community members of all ages working together. Also thanks to the ladies who prepared lunch. The afternoon proved to show community pride and I believe several city residents have acquired the clean-up fever. Keep it up Conde- you’re looking good.
Monday, May 19th will be the clean-up day for the city. We have the flyers out to start at 2:00 with a supper to be served at 6:00 for all the workers. We have new leadership for the event and good leadership it is. We will have a dumpster sitting across from the park and that will remain from the 14th through the 23rd. Because of sound leadership lots of questions have come up about various kinds of trash….what about that old paint and batteries? It sounds like people are ready to clean up!
The school children did a fine job two weeks ago along main street and around the school, this should complete the job for most of the town and be completed by Memorial Day. There are other projects such as some old cars that will be dealt with when a crusher is available and we hope that is completed by the end of June and before the All School Reunion. Am sure the Senior Citizens will offer a good meal to make us all glad we came.
The work on the will not be started with the clean up as The Young Men’s Club will help with that as a new slide needs to be put in, the old one taken down and protective ground cover put in place. We called in the City Insurance Representative for a most informative safety regulations to be followed. I didn’t know it but slides are made for the young to 5 years old and then 5 and up. Our new slide is for the 5 to 12 years old and we need to make sure that information is on the slide. We need to make sure that the park is segmented to the age groups so that there is less possibility for little ones getting trampled by bigger ones. Also, always place swings of like ages together and do not mix them. All these things sound so reasonable and who would know those regulations until you asked especially when your town is so small and you don’t have a Park and Rec. Department. We are so pleased that we will know the standards before we start.
Hello everyone! It is about time the grey haired old lady gets on board again to tell you of some of the activities. Believe the last time I was “on” I was highlighting the Mentoring workshop we were hosting. Well, snow cancellation and trying to pick other dates we did host it on May 4th…a Sunday and that kept several away but we had a good turnout. Our Extension Educator did an excellent job with the theme of “Tools for the Trade.” She had all of her tools on hand for table decorations, wore her tool belt that she conveniently used the pockets for cards for the program. We learned about Community Service as part of our program, civic engagement in how to get our children to be civic minded youth, positive youth development, program mentorship managment, positive guidance and discipline, parent as partners and what if bullying come up. The 5 to 6 hour seminar is not finished as we were all given a disc to have follow up and then upon completion we will each receive $25.00 for our organization or the new hat we couldn’t wait to purchase!!! We learned the difference between tattling and reporting, we worked in groups of the tools of the trade we were given in our packets. One of my favorite things was the parent backpacks. Wouldn’t it be fun to be able to leave the hospital with a new baby with a back pack of information on parenting skills, family activities, support and the list could just go on and on.
We will get into mentoring as we start summer activities for the children of the community. We have had a nice sign up for beginning woodworking, bread baking, making a beaded bracelet, beginning sewing and working with our pizza garden. We need to keep children busy and learning life skills that they can enjoy and make something with pride will give them some self esteem and maybe become entrepreneurs as we need to have a market for our hunters when they come in and what better way than to have the children of the community have things to sell. It should be a good summer of learning and fun. We have touched on a whole new segment of people who are so glad to help with the projects, too.
How will your community make decisions aboout seeking further resources to support it’s plan?
We as a community must continue to work with city leaders and employees with city projects. The permission of the city for some of our ideas should be acquired as they have local control, and access to city/state resources. They must be involved in some decision making. We should also include other area organizations as they too may have access to resources that we do not have. By including others in decision making we encourage more interest and opportunity.
In reference to category 8, question: what structural changes have been made in how the community does it’s work/makes decisions? I don’t know if this would be considered structural but I believe we have started to include people in some projects that would normally not get involved. This is important in creating substantial changes as the same few people cannot do it all. We have obtained the help of a local young man to set up a web site for Conde, by involving him in this we may stir up his community interest and involvement. The same goes for city wide cleanup committees. The more “new ” people we get involved the more new ideas we may acquire. If we involve them in planning and decision making they will be more interested in helping.
The ice cream social held Monday after the all school play was a great success thanks to Bev. The play cast and guests loved the ice cream sundaes and the donations received allowed the high school students to meet their estimated costs for the spring dance. Great idea Bev! We appreciate your time, talent and dedication to Horizons and the Conde community and school. Thank-you! Congratulations to the cast of ” Big Bad”. Your many hours of practice paid off as your performance was very entertaining-you all did a super job.
In answer to “What is your communities plan to maintaining a strong community leadership?” I believe by working together with the city council and Civic Development Organization and our youth we can maintain leadership. We must continue to support one another in events, activities and projects. We must keep encouraging each other that we can accomplish our goals if we stay positive and not let the negativity get us down. We shall continue to develop more interest in our community organizations by inviting and encouraging fellow citizens to take part. By including the youth in our projects and decision making we can hopefully raise some future strong leaders for Conde.