Seeds of community change
I grew up in a small town in the northwest corner of Connecticut. A town of 10,000 people that was home to a robust light-industrial economy and surrounded by natural beauty, small farms and a rich community history. It was one of those apparently idyllic communities where, as a child, you were free to roam the woods, streets from dawn until dusk. Scarce few homes had working locks in their front doors, most neighborhood houses had welcoming porches, and there were few fences dividing property lines. The abundance of summer gardens were shared, Vinnie delivered milk to your door, you knew Ray the mailman, and in the winter you shoveled your walk and the walks of your elderly neighbors. The seasons were punctuated with community events, community parades, volunteer fireman’s carnival, music in the town park, German beer fest (a Lions Club fundraiser), and ice skating on the lake in the winter. Everyone was connected, churches, civic club, bowling league, community sports for kids and leagues for adults.
Back in the day, Winsted was home to the Gilbert Clock Factory and Hitchcock furniture —once renowned brands tied to quality. There was a woolen industry at Winsted Hosiery, Mason Silk, and the New England Knitting Co., and electrical appliances made by the Fitzgerald Manufacturing Co., Sun Chief and Waring in the next town over. Supporting this manufacturing were smaller companies that made parts, sheet metal, shipping boxes. Together, these manufacturing businesses created industrial clusters, supported by a skilled workforce working at union wage jobs, and the supported small retail businesses and independent grocery stores.
There also was an underside of poverty, fairly easy access to drugs and alcohol, the hush-toned gossip of affairs, domestic violence, crime beneath the radar. As the sixties progressed the town saw the start of the long dismantling of its manufacturing economic base. Likely the intersection of greed, the false promise of offshoring jobs, and the dawning of stronger environmental regulations, closures began to undermine the economic ecology and tear the social fabric of our community. By the time I was a teenager the majority of industries were shifting production out of the area to avoid both the union demands and to escape environmental legislation and, by the late seventies, the a number of vacant manufacturing sites grew. That is when I left my hometown, only to return as a side stop when I was in New England visiting family.
I do not lament leaving my childhood hometown, nor do I pine with nostalgia, remembering the good old days. Rather I look back at my childhood that provided me with four seeds of community change. First is the seed of interconnected people, where all of us thrive, not by being rugged individualists, but by being woven into the social fabric of community. The second seed is that interdependence is build on myopically local economy, public spaces, and social connectivity. We cannot off shore or import and strong local economy. The third seed is that civic pride is non-negotiable, whether is picking up trash, planting flowers, attending church, being involved with a civic club, or volunteering with a local nonprofit, investing in your community creates a strong community self-esteem. The final seed is that that we must spend time, rebuilding a vision for a sustainable future and work with grit and sweat and, at times, monkey wrenches, to achieve that vision.
We need a new approach to community development. An approach grounded in systems rather silos and focused on rebuilding at the local economic level. Like the town of my childhood, there are too many local economies that are hollowed out factories that remain empty. Community leaders face a choice, let industrial decay (literal or figurative) become a photojournalism project or invest in designing and implementing hyperlocal strategies that concurrently build connections between people, recapture local economies, and expand civic pride.
Together we can make a difference.
