Crawford County's Vision for the Future

Community business leaders can access the knowledge and experience of world-renowned leaders by attending Chick-fil-A Leadercast at Gospel Baptist Church in Galion on May 4, 2012.  

On February 2, 2012, Ohio Heartland Community Action Commission, which serves Crawford County, won a Best Practice award from the Ohio Association of Community Action Agencies (OACAA) for its Backpack program.

The tireless work that is needed to improve a community often goes unnoticed. On Monday, January 24, the Crawford: 20/20 Vision recognized community leaders for their efforts to move Crawford County forward in a positive direction.

The Crawford: 20/20 Vision has officially launched the new leadership development program for Crawford County called Crawford Unlimited Leadership (CU Lead). This annual, 9-month long leadership training program has received major underwriting from the Ohio Mutual Insurance Group. In May, Jim Kennedy, President of Ohio Mutual Insurance Group, announced the creation of a $200,000 fund to help start and sustain the program.

Crawford County Economic Development Partnership (CCEDP), the group that led the public creation of the Crawford: 20/20 Vision, has named Pastor J.C. Church (pictured at right) chair of the initiative’s oversight Vision Committee. He now leads the group that ensures collaboration and participation in the county’s vision plan in the coming years. Pastor Church is the Senior Pastor at Victory in Truth Ministries on SR 4 south of Bucyrus. He is also co-founder and board member of Together We Hurt, Together We Heal, in Crawford County, and was chairman of CC Lift, the county wide recovery effort after the devastating flooding in August 2007.

ONE YEAR AGO:

Researching. Discussing. Planning. Informing. Listening. 

At this time last year, the Vision team was in the midst of a series of large community meetings, looking to identify problems and engage the community.

The next step in the Vision process was to take the pre-identified issues and create some way to improve them now and in the future. So, a 20/20 Vision plan was written to guide the county through the next decade, addressing four specific areas: Business Success & Job Availability, Workforce Education & Preparation, Public Safety & Drug Abuse and overall Quality of Life.

In cooperation with the Crawford Park District, Ohio Mutual Insurance Group has begun a two-year project to convert a visible area of the company’s main campus from turf grass to native prairie flora.

Recently, individuals and organizations in Crawford County have made great strides in promoting and creating opportunities for leadership development.

During the 2011 Chick-fil-a Leadercast, Ohio Mutual Insurance Group (OMIG) announced its commitment of $200,000 to establish and sustain a community development effort called “Crawford Unlimited Leadership” (CULead) via Crawford: 20/20 Vision, a countywide improvement initiative.

The Crawford County Economic Development Partnership, Inc. (CCEDP) is charged with implementation of the Crawford: 20/20 Vision plan.

The challenges Crawford County faces are significant: unemployment, lack of educational attainment beyond high school, workforce skill needs, decreasing population, a remaining aging population, duplication of services causing inefficiencies in government and social services agencies and a rising use and demand of public assistance.

Crawford: 20/20 Vision has been established to determine specific challenges within the realms of the aforementioned topics, to form strategic solutions based on community input and to ultimately implement an unprecedented plan to take action to improve Crawford County.