Husband attends a weekly men’s bible study at our church, and a man more elderly than Husband welcomed him and told him he had moved to a good county, as people here take care of each other.
I always knew that people here were good to one another, but this was really brought home to me by an article in the local paper last week that a private and county funded program was paying for outpatient mental health treatment for county residents with unaffordable deductibles or no insurance. There has been a 200% increase in residents using the program over the past year. Eligible residents only need to pay $25 per session for up to 10 sessions. As a mental health professional and county resident I am elated to hear this. I believe we will contribute to this fund.
Yesterday we attended the grand opening of the new butcher shop in town started with funds from a community group and owned and operated by the granddaughter of our former milk man. It is a wonderful place, and hundreds of people visited it and loved it.
Husband has signed up for a canoe/kayak day trip on the Rock River on June 13th sponsored by the Chamber of Comnerce. He is renting a canoe from the Chamber for the trip. The woman at the Chamber was so concerned that a canoe might be too much for him that she told him they will bring an extra kayak just in case he needs it. I am really happy we moved here!
What has your city or county done lately that makes you proud? What are your favorite charities and local help organizations?
Trail Baboon 
Living in Minneapolis proper, I don’t have many occasions to think any warm thoughts about the city itself. And not to make this political, but I will say that in the last year, our mayors spicy reactions to both the Annunciation shootings and the ICE situation struck a cord with me. I know he came under fire for not being “nice” but I think both of those situations deserved non-calmness.
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i am a frey fan
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On the flipside, I live in a great neighborhood. Even being on a busy street, on our side we are close. We know each other, we socialize, and we take care of each other if needed.
We’re all in atwitter this week because there’s been a lot of movement at the house that sold a couple of lots down. It looks like mostly they’re removing all the things from the house that were there for the staging before the sale, but we’re looking forward to a new neighbor to draw into our little community.
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You are very lucky to have so many interested in that neighborhood togetherness. I imagine you might have a lot to do with it, VS. We have something similar going with our next door neighbors, but hardly anyone else nearby seems interested.
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I agree that VS likely has a lot to do with her neighborhood community!
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hope its not ice headquarters
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We have some very active groups in Winona who have supported immigrant families (various S. American, Afghan), providing temporary housing as they find their way to permanent situations, and helped to fix up houses.
A few years ago, the huge Methodist church (where we UUs rent our space) housed an immigrant family temporarily in a section of vacant basement rooms.
I am not proud to say: we are having a hard time finding a permanent shelter, after the previous location became unavailable. This past winter, the church mentioned above served as a homeless shelter from November – end of March. Sadly, April 1 a homeless man died on the streets during a very cold night.
We have so far been able to prevent permits for grossly oversized feedlots. I do not know enough to talk intelligently about either of these, but have friends who can.
Less recently, we were able to ban sand fracking in the County.
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I see several errors in there (I was moving paragraphs around), but you no doubt get the drift…
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Rise and Shine, Baboons,
Nothing could have made me prouder than our metro area’s peaceful, activist response to the ICE occupation during the winter. I know many people, often the parents of school age children, who were getting groceries, driving kids (not their own) to school, standing in a human chain around bus stops so kids could safely board (several were sprayed with substances), etc. I could not participate in direct interventions, but I gave every penny I could to all the people and organizations doing this so rent was paid and people were fed. I was not concerned about grift.
This all occurred regionally and within every municipality, not just Minneapolis. These folks were heroic and I am so proud of them. My friend in Ireland wrote to tell me that this response was inspiring respect all over the world.
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I was proud of Minneapolis residents stepping up the way they did too. I was, and still am, so proud to be a Minnesotan.
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Owatonnans are quite charitable overall. Our large businesses play a huge role in supporting The United Way, Big Brothers Big Sisters, the local food shelf, and many other worthy causes. We get great turnouts for fundraisers for local charities or to help individuals or to remember loved ones with memorial events such as fun runs, chili cook offs, etc.
There’s a relatively new group called Rainbowatonna that supports LGBTQ people and causes. They’ve caught flack from some in town, but the new mayor has backed them 100% and strives to include and consider everyone’s viewpoints when decisions are made.
We’re not perfect by any means, but overall, I’m glad to live in such a charitable and helpful community.
Chris in Owatonna
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I still think of “my town” as being Northfield, but Dundas is making me proud too – in a different way. Dundas is building and capitalizing on its natural resources in a big way. Trails are being developed throughout the village with connections to the Northfield trail system. The City is buying in to the new ice rink Northfield is building – partnerships of this kind make expensive projects achievable. Dundas is also growing, and developing commercial real estate along the Hwy 3 corridor, while allowing residential growth on the west and southeastern-most sides.
I’ve always been proud of Northfield. The attitude of most community members is supportive and tolerant. Arts and music are highly valued. There’s always something interesting going on. The two colleges and the City work together to support the city and its residents. The police have been very supportive during the numerous protests over the past couple of years. The Community Action Center is the best anywhere at supporting and feeding people in need. They coordinate volunteers for all kinds of needs, and support many people in finding housing and securing employment. They work with a variety of abilities, ages, languages and cultures.
Many people are complaining loudly about the trail development because it is extensive and some of the most valuable real estate in Northfield has been impacted by the state trail as it comes through. I question why DNR routed the trail through the town. I suspect the City itself wanted to draw tourism into town. I think the trail would have been better routed through ag land along township and county roads east of town instead of going through town, hacking old trees out of the Carleton Arb, and condemning residential real estate in the “snob hill” area.
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BTW, Renee, I am delighted to hear you find such pleasure in Luverne.
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I forgot to add that the local drug store has a special community funded program to help people who can’t afford to pay for their prescription meds.
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Habitat For Humanity is my number 1 “charity.”
HFH is not totally charity. The homes I’ve worked on in Minnesota and Ohio were along side the families who would live in the homes. Call it “sweat equity” if you will but I choose to call it “shared sweat”
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Yes, Habitat here, too, makes me proud. Husband still does some painting with the old guys group when he can…
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Favorite help organization would be Winona Volunteer Services, which organizes Winona’s version of meals-on-wheels, runs the local food pantry, has a used clothing shop, etc. Run mostly by volunteers.
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I’ve been serving as an election judge for over 25 years now, and I’m proud of the way Minnesota elections are conducted. Procedures were under the microscope during the recounts of 2008 and 2010. There were many improvements adopted after those years. It’s my belief that Minnesota is a real leader in honest and accurate elections. Anybody who says the results can’t be trusted is just deluded, or has been lied to.
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