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Going out on a limb with a dull saw -- and no parachute
(May 4, 2010) -- I can count on my fingers, and a couple of toes, how many times I have sat in on a study group during which the facilitator asks a series of questions to put together a mosaic of Anson County.
What are your strengths?
What are your weaknesses?
What are your opportunities?
What are your threats?
The so-named SWOT method is in widespread use by consulting firms that are hired by governmental or tax-exempt organizations to present a bound booklet containing SWOT background and, perhaps, to address the county's woes with suggestions, priorities or an action plan for economic development. As far as I know, every published report about Anson County's past, present and future is on a shelf somewhere gathering dust or in a file cabinet drawer with all the previously published plans.
The last published report was the "Anson County Economic Development Action Plan," pieced together by the Cary-based Sanford Holshouser Business Development Group (SHBDG) and printed in September 2007.
The strengths are usually the same: affordable land, water and sewer availability, a four-lane highway (U.S. 74) that cuts an east-west swath from Union County to Richmond County, access to Interstates 40 and 85 in the Greensboro area via I-73&74 and U.S. 220, and access to the Port of Wilmington via U.S. 74 and I-74.
The SHBDG lists the "usual suspects" as strengths: a small-town, rural atmosphere, South Piedmont Community College, the county's airport, the Wadesboro Rotary Planetarium and Science Center, the Pee Dee National Wildlife Refuge, the Anson County Chamber of Commerce and the Anson County Tourism Development Authority.
Anson's weaknesses are oftentimes the same, too: prevalent illiteracy, the endless cycle of poverty, white/black relationships and cultural differences, apathetic elected county officials and, a new one that recently surfaced -- an inferiority complex.
It's a we're-down-we'll-never-get-up-so-why-worry attitude held by many Ansonians who may, or may not, be illiterate, mired in the social services syndrome (generations suckling from the government teat), and are fed up with their elected officials, but feel they cannot do anything about the situation.
The SHBDG report tells us that Ansonians have a growing social problem, a lack of skills among the unemployed workers and poor student performances in the public school system. Since September 2007, the local N.C. Employment Security Commission's JobLinks program and SPCC's myriad of training classes has addressed the skills segment; and, under the Anson County Board of Education and Superintendent Greg Firn's astute leadership, the poor educational element has been on a road to recovery. Anson County is by no means out of the woods yet, but some of us see a light at the end of the proverbial tunnel.
Another program, Circles of Hope (a commitment by area churches, organizations, clubs and individuals, including those most concerned -- people in poverty), is meeting the subject of poverty head-on and, in time, will produce results to end the cycle of poverty and individuals' hopelessness, joblessness and, maybe, turn an inferiority complex into a revelation of "We can succeed. See!"
Opportunities abound to achieve success. However, leadership is a key component to achieve success. The Chamber of Commerce's Leadership Anson program continues to graduate future leaders, who are involved in one way or another in the leadership make-up -- whether in their church, a club or organization, or on the political scene. The Anson Economic Development Corp. has a board of directors with leadership background and qualities. One program that I like to highlight is Smart Start, administrated locally by the Anson County Partnership for Children and staffed by personnel dedicated to bettering opportunities for children -- who eventually will become Anson's leaders and decision-makers.
As with any report, the threats magnify the socio-economic travails of all Ansonians, whether county natives or emigrants (like the Marshall Family) who have chosen the county as the place to reside, work, raise their children and become involved with the complexities of local SWOTs.
Since moving to Wadesboro in 1990, the "status quo" attitude by some (slowly being erased through attrition), the "mill owners" attitude (vanishing into thin air as the textile industry becomes passe and more progressive leadership evolves in executive positions), and the feeling of helplessness among the less fortunate, always have been in the forefront of "threats" to the county.
Personally, as editor of The Anson Record and executive director of the Chamber of Commerce, I have maintained that Anson County is like a growing flower bud ready to blossom. We have experienced tiny blooms in the past but the big bloom (boom?) is still to come.
All said (or written in this case), I hope I'm not climbing out on a limb with a dull hacksaw blade-- and no parachute to bring me to safety below when the bough breaks. It's my opinion -- and I'll stick by it.
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