By SCOTT SHAFFER News-Gazette Features Editor Sep 5, 2023
Over the last several weeks four “Community Engagement Meetings.” These meetings are being used to celebrate what has been accomplished through Randolph County’s “Cultivating Community” initiative, and to gather feedback from the community on ways to continue to improve life in Randolph County.
Cultivating Community is a partnership between Randolph County United, the Community Foundation of Randolph County, Ball State University’s Indiana Communities Institute, and the community. As a part of Cultivating Community, committees have been formed to focus on ways of improving a number of aspects of life in Randolph County, from parks, trails, and waterways, to housing, education, childcare, and technology; several quality of life issues are being examined.
Among the accomplishments of the initiative over the last two and a half years are the production of a brochure promoting all of the parks in Randolph County. Signs for each park, featuring Randy Raccoon are being produced. Work is also being done on improving local trails and hopefully connecting them to the Cardinal Greenway. An internship program between local businesses and schools has also been started. The county has also entered into an agreement with the Housing Resource Hub.
Quarterly “Coffee & Conversations” have been held to discuss different professional and personal growth topics. Plans are underway to begin hosting business retention interviews with local businesses.
These four meetings took place in Farmland, Losantville, Union City, and Winchester. During these meetings, those in attendance were then grouped into tables with each person given paper leaves. They were instructed to write down things that they have done to better the community on each leaf. These leaves were then placed on a tree with leaves from the previous meetings.
Pieces of paper with shovels on them were then distributed, with each person writing an idea on each paper for ways to improve the community. The tables then discussed these ideas, narrowing them into what they felt were the five most important at their table. These ideas varied from supporting local businesses to beautifying and maintaining our natural areas such as parks and waterways, better promoting local events, improving child care opportunities, and being more inclusive of the smaller communities in Randolph County perhaps even finding ways to revive some community events that have gone by the wayside in recent years as membership in the organizations who have traditionally supported these events has dwindled.
In the coming days all of this feedback will be examined prior to a meeting on Sept. 21 at the Randolph County Fairgrounds from 9:00 am until 3:30 pm. This meeting is entitled “Cultivating Community: The Next Act.” At this meeting this feedback will be discussed to determine what is next for the Cultivating Community Initiative going forward. As this is a lengthy meeting, a lunch will be provided for those who attend.