Waukon, IA

The Allamakee New Beginnings board members met on June 5 with Sandy Scholl from ISU Extension. Sandy is a community development specialist and met with the ANB to help them develop a mission statement. First she asked them “why does ANB exist?”
To assist those in poverty
To help people meet basic needs
Help to be tied to education and teaching
To coordinate various assistance
Partnering to get ahead
Improving lifestyle
Collaborating with other agencies
Lessen the effects of poverty — through education
Investing in families and community to help them improve themselves
Make resources available to help people move ahead
Wake up the resources they have

Key words were identified in this list and after a couple of iterations, the following draft mission statement was agreed upon.

Allamakee New Beginning, Inc. exists to seek and manage resources as a charitable organization to lessen the effects of poverty by investing in families and individuals through education and collaboration.

The mission and vision will be further developed in future meetings. The ANB board also set a regular meeting date–the third Thursday of the month.

The mayor and several city councilmen are interesting the data being collected from the sidewalk assessments. They want to prioritize sidewalk repair around the schools to encourage more kids to walk and bike to school. Sidewalk repair was a major piece of their platform at the election. Already, you can see new stretches of sidewalks around town. It is nice to have the leadership interested in the appearance and safety of our town.

In addition, the area recently received a Safe Routes to School grant which will help us do student and parent surveys to learn more about the walking and biking habits of people in our town.