The League of Kansas Municipalities recently completed their third-annual Hometown Showdown photo competition. The Hometown Showdown is a bracket-style competition where Kansas cities go head-to-head to move on in each round until the final round. The final round featured the cities of Plainville and Haysville. Plainville won the final round and was named the winner on April 11.
The City of Plainville submitted a photo of their Veterans Memorial in Andreson Park. The memorial was dedicated in 2016 on Veterans Day after years of community fundraising. The memorial honors all five military services: Air Force, Army, Coast Guard, Marine Corps and Navy.
“We are so proud of our tribute to our veterans,” said Plainville Mayor Kelli Hansen. “This contest was a great opportunity for the community to come together for a common goal of showcasing our memorial across the state.”
Hansen noted that the community excitement during the Hometown Showdown was an overwhelming experience.
“Plainville really ‘rallied the troops’ to get through each round by networking with our alumni groups, schools, businesses, friends, and family,” said Hansen. “Our Veterans Memorial will forever be a source of great pride for our community because of what it stands for, but now we’ve shared that with the entire state and even across our great nation.”
This year’s competition was the largest yet with 80 cities participating. Through the competition, members shared dozens of stories of positive engagement and excitement stemming from the contest.
“The competition was exciting and fulfilled our goal of giving cities a way to broaden their social media footprint and create lasting citizen engagement opportunities,” said Erik Sartorius, League of Kansas Municipalities Executive Director. “We’ve watched as thousands of people commented about their memories of growing up in or living in Kansas cities. Thousands of people responded with great emotion to seeing landmarks, community events or the stunningly beautiful scenery of Kansas,” said Sartorius.
The contest winner will have their photo placed on the cover of a future issue of the Kansas Government Journal.
“We want to recognize the hard work and passion of our member cities through this competition,” said Sartorius. “We’ll be creating feature articles in the Kansas Government Journal on the cities of Haysville, Newton and Marysville who made it to the final and semi-final rounds. The stories each of these cities tell about how they gathered support for the competition is compelling and speaks to their passion for their communities.”
This year’s photos were stunning: rodeo days in Coffeyville, a carnival in Hoxie, wild west throwbacks in Dodge City and Ellis, quintessential downtown scenes from Pittsburg and Marysville, and stunning winter wonderland scenes from Newton and Cimarron. Kansas’ cities are remarkable places to call home.
The League is a membership organization representing over 500 cities in Kansas which advocates on behalf of cities, offers training and guidance to city appointed and elected officials, and has a clear purpose of strengthening Kansas communities. Since 1910, the League has been a resource for cities across Kansas and has acted as a body to share ideas, facilitate communication between members, and provide information on best practices in city operations.