Choteau, MT

We started last fall with the Study Circles, went into Leadership Plenty during the winter, saw a bunch of survey forms (that was Visioning) during the summer, heard about a few groups trying to accomplish some things… so where are we with this whole Horizons process? Refer to the graphic below, and/or go to http://www.horizonsmt.org/docs/2008%20Community%20Guide.pdf for a more detailed graphic. But let me also explain:

In a nutshell, we are in the upper left quadrant of the circle, having completed the Community Visioning this summer and early fall. And guess what that means? Not only are we ready to move more fully to Action - the part you’ve all been waiting for. Also, we could be eligible for grant money to help make some of those Action Items a reality. … But what actually happens now that we are on to Action? And what Actions are we going to take?

We’ve heard over the past several months about some Action items members of the community have taken on: a Community Garden, the notion of a Community Service requirement for high school students, the Neighbors Helping Neighbors program to help connect people with the resources of all sorts that they need, and the development of a Community Scholarship to help children and adults participate in a variety of activities, from arts to sports to everything in between. You may ask, what else do we need to be doing?

During the Community Visioning process, the entire town of Choteau was invited to weigh in on what we thought would help really make Choteau shine - and note that many people pointed out that Choteau is already a pretty good place to live and work!. The top 3 Action items that came from the Visioning survey and subsequent vote by participants in the “Squashfest” this fall were:

• Provide more support to community businesses by purchasing goods locally
• Develop life skills education classes for all ages
• Encourage random acts of kindness and a campaign to promote volunteerism

Where will we go with these items? Stay tuned….. !