By BECKY KISER
Hays Post
Turnout for Tuesday’s night’s first of three town hall meetings hosted by the United Way of Ellis County (UWEC) was very small, but UWEC Executive Director Sherry Dryden was not disappointed.
“It only takes one person to get started,” she said. “We want to hear from the community instead of guessing what the United Way needs to be doing in Ellis County, what the needs are to be addressed, our community impact.”
The town hall meetings are a first for UWEC.
“We’ve always been listening to United Way worldwide and our local partner agencies. We’re hoping to hear from everyone, all ages, all walks of life, how to help this United Way grow in the best interest of Ellis County,” Dryden explained.
Tuesday’s participants talked about the three core areas on which United Way focuses–education, health and financial stability–and offered personal opinions on what specific needs exist for each in the community. After tossing out and discussing six to eight needs in each category, the group came to a consensus on the top three in each category. Then came a “SWOT” analysis, identifying the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats of the agreed upon top needs.
This first group’s concerns included cooperation between local businesses and students in preparation for employer expectations of new employees.They said more well-paying jobs are needed in the community as well as quality affordable housing to recruit and retain employees. The group talked about the importance of young people remaining in Ellis County to live, work and raise families. They pointed out the distance residents must travel for healthcare and noted telemedicine is helping fill the gaps.
“We’re not necessarily going to fix these problems,” Dryden stressed, “but we need to figure out how to work through the problems and continue to grow. We need to identify the problems and then focus on getting a group together to help work through the problems.”
The exercise has already been conducted with the UWEC’s 15 partner agencies, according to Dryden. Two other town hall meetings will be held this week, Thu., June 8, 8:30-10 a.m.; and Sat., June 10, 9-11 a.m. Dryden hopes the Thursday morning meeting will draw a number of business people.
All meetings will be held in the Hays Hadley Center, 205 E. 7th St. in the first floor conference room. Directional signs will be posted.
Later this month, the United Way will conduct an online community needs assessment survey as a result of the town hall meeting outcomes.
“We want to be able to address it by the time we do our 2018 campaign kickoff which will be at the end of August,” Dryden said. “This will help strengthen not only the United Way of Ellis County but also our 15 partner agencies, and open the door for other entities to have more of a collaboration overall.”