Presho, SD

Horizons II is planning a graduation celebration Thursday June 26th at 5:30pm in the City Park.  There will be a free meal at the picinic shelter and free swimming at the pool.  Local groups will be speaking about various community projects and Kari will be there to present our check, laptop and printer.  The whole community is invited to attend, hope to see you there!!

Horizon members, Thrivent Financial for Lutherans members, Modern Woodmen members, and the Lyman County Museum members worked together to work at arranging articles at the new Thrift Store and More; cleaning up the town; cleaning the Merchants Park and cleaning at the Museum to get it ready for the opening on Memorial Day.  Thanks to all who so generously donated time to work on these projects to make Join Hands Day activities a success.  Flower plots were cleared at the park and the museum and flowers will be planted when the danger of frost has passed.

Question 8.  Through the Horizon session our community has learned that there are many potential leaders who can and will take charge and promote activities that they feel are important.  A number of individuals have stepped forward to help with the Thrift Store that is being started in Presho.  Different people have stepped forward to help promote and insure the success of the newly implemented Senior Meals program.  Horizons has helped to generate interest in welfare of the citizens of the community and has brought more people into the decision making process.   Communication among the citizens about the projects and donations of time and resources has increased.

In what new or expanded ways are people contributing to your community? I’ve been pleased with the phone calls and comments from people in the community on the projects we’ve started and the donations, offers of volunteer work and ideas are very welcome indeed. There’s seems to be excitement about the Thrift Store and others have commented about projects that are in the works such as the bike/walking path. Now we are asking people to join us in these ventures. We will be asking groups as well as individuals to help with clean-up, painting, shelving, and more. This is a project for the people, by the people.

What community resources will be needed to sustain the community plan to reduce poverty? One of our March questions that needs answering…COMMUNITY VOLUNTEERS are needed to help clean and paint the inside of the building we will be renting from Chad Johnson at the N. end of main so that we can start bringing in racks and shelving that is also needed at this time. I am excited to get this project off the ground finally. Teresa has gotten a business plan put together and the board had their first official meeting. So one of the things we need to look at is the resources to get this project moving ahead. This could definitely reduce poverty when we have the opportunity to offer clothing and household goods at a greatly reduced price to local residents and, hopefully with advertising, other communities as well. Our residents are our most valuable resource we have! Money, paint, cleaning supplies, racks, shelves, counter, storage containers, etc. are small things that are needed. Once the store is open people, again, are the resource we need to frequent the Thrift store for it to thrive. There is a lot of community interest in this project and so far the Change Presho canisters have done pretty well to start with. We would like to be able to put some of this money back into the community businesses as well by purchasing the supplies we need. But most importantly, as already stated, volunteers are the most needed resource right now. We will also need volunteers to run the store once we get it off the ground. There are great, fun ways to reward these volunteers, too. Call and find out how we plan to do that!! Contact Michelle Lintvedt or Teresa Shook.

In what new or expanded ways are people contributing to your community?
The thrift store name contest got 53 entries, 40 from people that have never been involved in the Horizon II project.
2 board members of the thrift store are emerging leaders that are new to our projects.
I have received several calls about donating to the thrift store.
Area groups are wanting to volunteer time to get the store ready to open.

Launch ‘08 is a one-day event advancing entrepreneurship education in
SD on Thursday, February 28, on Dakota Wesleyan University in Mitchell. The 2008 conference features two tracks: Educator track is geared toward those who are interested in integrating innovative and creative thinking within their respective disciplines. This year’s conference features the following internationally-renowned speakers: Ed Sobey, PhD, global evangelist for creative learning and founding Director of the Northwest Invention Center, The National Inventors Hall of Fame and National Toy Hall of Fame; Kathleen R. Allen, PhD, a nationally recognized and respected leader, consultant, speaker and author of numerous books on entrepreneurship as well as the Director of the University of Southern California Marshall Center for Technology Commercialism; and Timothy M. Stearns, PhD., holder of the Coleman Foundation Chair in Entrepreneurial Studies and the executive director of the Lyles Center for Innovation and Entrepreurship at California State University-Fresno.
If you are interested in attending Launch ‘08, email Martha at martha.landes@sdstate.edu (registration deadline is February 15)

In a recent survey Presho increased its knowledge of leadership in the community.  The survey shows that 57.1% of Presho’s LP participants felt they had increased their leadership skills and that 58.6% of this increase was due to participating in the LP study.

According to the survey 71.4% of Presho participants intend to use their leadership skills to work on poverty reduction.  The same percentage of respondents reported that they intended to involve more people in community decision-making.

The Horizons project has helped Presho to address or change poverty in their community as shown by 71.4% of respondents indicating that more people are aware of poverty in the community.  The survey shows that Presho participants showed an increase in leadership skills and abilities across all categories.

The idea behind the “Change Presho” campaign is to ask folks to donate to a community project the change they receive from local businesses . For example, your bill at Husman’s could be $23.12. If you wrote your check for $24, it would be easier to balance your account and you could donate 88 cents to a community project. I think we would all be surprised how much money we could raise this way for really very little effort or expense on any one person. What could a community project be - maybe some possibilities would be trees in the boulevards, community signs, the community resource booklet, there are many ideas that could be pursued. What do others think of this idea? Cast your votes in the poll currently being conducted!

 Here are our early preliminary goals.  Please comment.