
point of view
Excelsior Springs, Missouri
Hope from Lemons
It's not unusal for a child to run a lemonade stand, but not many feel like they have to. A 7-year old Alabama youngster's mother died unexpectedly & couldn't understand why everyone else got a giant granite headstone, but her mother just received a tiny metal one. Her gma tried to explain that the family couldn't afford a headstone. She wanted to help, so started a lemonade stand. As word got out, it seemed like just about everyone was thirsty for lemonade. "The price was $1, but people like it so much, they often paid more. The most that we got from one cup of lemonade was $300." So, far, she has raised more than $15,000, which will go into savings because a monument company is now donating the headstone. This young girl has taken that lemon life handed her, & squeezed out hope. Saw on Sunday Morning
week of April 22nd
Monday, 9-3 - Administrative Professionals Day; 4pm - Capital Improvements Committee
Tuesday, 4pm - Community Center Committee; 4:30 pm - Municipal Court; 6pm - Parks & Recreation
Thursday, 9am - Thrive Joint Task Force; 10am - Housing Authority
Friday, 9-12 - Staff Retreat, 1:20pm - Career Conversations @ HS
upcoming agendas
Administrative Professionals Day - MARC presents the Four Tendencies: How to Influence People (including yourself!) The framework developed by happiness & habits researcher that focuses on the follow-through, & practice implementing it at work & in life. Serves as a guide for building strong teams & influencing action in others.
Parks & Recreation will hear financial reports, staff & committee reports, consider proposal to purchase church land adjacent to splash park, proposal regarding social media archive, MPRA conference update, staffing updates, trailer purchase, & Earth Day Clean Up Event.
Capital Improvement will consider approval of plumbing repairs to the Police Station & boiler replacement at Hall of Waters.
Community Center Advisory Board will hear staff reports
Career Conversations - HS students will be exposed to a variety of career fields so they can make informed choices
making a difference
- Recognizing Administrative Professionals this week, who provide invaluable support to their departments: Susan Conyers (City Manager & Council), Sarah Davis (Fire), Jenni Kerr (Police), Kelli Kincaid (HR), Janet Morehead (Parks), Lisa Morgan (Community Development), Kathy Twitchell & Debby Willimetz (Public Works).
- Shout out to Mayor Mark Spohn, Brian Rice, Jason Cole, & Clint Reno for contributing to an excellent delivery of the State of the City address @ last week's Clay County EDC event, which provides an opportunity for clay county cities to brag about all of the good things happening in their city. Wow! The presentation will be on our website soon.
- Thank you to Shannon Stroud, Kelli Kincaid, & our lovely Intern for hosting a fabulous volunteer appreciation dinner last week. Taco Bar & rock painting were a hit. Thank you Janet Morehead.
small town vibes
- Working on calendar of dates for rolling out the comprehensive plan & citizen input; KSU is developing a student design charette for the old hospital site on Superior to identify future development potential in September; Free bulky item drop-off @ recycling site is being planned for May 11th; this is to compensate for a rough transition to one-day/week curb-site trash collection.
- Surveying area in Crown Hill Cemetery to create designated area for cremation urns
- Community Center hosts a home school PE class for 18-20 students/week; we are planning to deflate the pool dome this week & begin getting ready for summer.
- Earth Day Cleanup was this weekend, teams of volunteers cleaned up Wyman site and Sunnyside. People are generous with their time & interest in cleaning up.
- Not an official count, but the Piccadilly event collected around $41,000 for Milwaukee inclusive park. People are generous for a good cause.
choose your attitude!
The brick streets, buildings & rock masonry of ES is superb. We are fortunate to have Hall of Waters, Elms Hotel, railroads depots, ES Museum Archives we have some very nice homes in our township. The 1st parks & the old stone walls & stairways that tell such interesting stories. It would have been lovely to visit in the 20s & stoll through the parks from one spring pavilion to the next. Read it on Facebook.