By BECKY KISER
Hays Post
Housing. Childcare. Condition of Hays schools. Low unemployment rate.
These are among major concerns the local business community has recently identified as issues holding back healthy growth in Ellis County.
Local residents had the opportunity Monday night to chime in with their thoughts during an Imagine Ellis County (IEC) town hall meeting at the Hays Hilton Garden Inn.
"There are no bad ideas tonight," Betty Johnson, facilitator and Dane G. Hansen Foundation director of strategic doing, said to the crowd of more than 80 people.
The audience included a mix of local business owners, students, retirees, city and county employees, educators, and representatives of the religious community and non-profit sector.
"We have lots of nice videos about how great it is to live in Ellis County, but nobody knows about it," said Doug Williams, Grow Hays executive director.
IEG has received grants from the Hansen Foundation, the Schmidt Foundation and the Heartland Community Foundation to produce the videos in partnership with Eagle Communications/Eagle Creative of Hays.
A marketing campaign for Ellis County will include creating a website, utilizing geofencing, and using various social media platforms along with traditional advertising billboards.
Towns along the eastern slope of the Colorado Rocky Mountains will be targeted, according to Williams. It's an urban area from which some families have begun moving, looking for smaller and safer communities in which to raise their families.
Safe, clean, and quiet communities, along with good law enforcement, was often an answer to questions posed to the participants by Johnson.
Broken into small groups, they discussed the things Ellis County is doing right and why they live in Ellis County.
The positive comments included community pride, strong work ethic, support of small businesses, great parks, variety of educational institutions, big city amenities with a small town feel, and good medical care.
Then it was time to talk about the not so great things in Ellis County and what's stopping Ellis County from being more successful.
Answers and suggestions reached into the far-flung corners of the county, including better connections of the small Ellis County towns to the county seat of Hays, more diverse retail and restaurant options, retention and recruitment of young people, as well as retirees from the region.
"They shop and pay their bills," quipped a representative of one group.
Transportation between the towns and into Hays was seen as a needed improvement. Getting people out of Ellis County when they need to travel is also a little more complicated now.
"We recently lost our Greyhound bus service," noted another group speaker.
Other areas listed as needs were activities and events for middle school students, a better senior center, and a large community center.
Roadblocks included affordable land, fear of change, lack of racial diversity, a shrinking oil and gas economy as the nation turns toward green energy options, mentoring of new leaders, transfer of wealth, and future funding for all of the ideas and suggestions.
Finally, the groups gazed into the future and talked about what they see in Ellis County 20 years from now; the year is 2042.
"More roundabouts," promised one group, drawing laughter and applause from the others. Another group envisioned the traffic roundabouts in Hays would become "hoverways."
Also in the near future Fort Hays State University will have the largest student enrollment among Kansas colleges, thanks to increased online learning and its virtual college. Mental health services will be provided in schools. The R-9 Ranch in Edwards County owned by Hays and Russell will be providing abundant water to the immediate area.
So what's next?
"We've got some great momentum going here and we want to continue this. ... This is invaluable input," Williams said at the end of the meeting.
After compilation, Monday's feedback will be publicly available on the Imagine Ellis County Facebook page and future website.
The FHSU Docking Institute of Public Affairs has been engaged to conduct a community survey this summer to give additional guidance of what people are looking for and what Ellis County needs to be doing to attract them.
Offering remote work and learning opportunities through an expanded internet infrastructure is one key, according to Williams.
He talked about a recent interview he watched with Karin Kimbrough, chief economist for Linkedin, the world's largest job search website.
"She gave some statistics that pre-pandemic 1 in 67 jobs on LinkedIn was for remote workers. Today it's 1 in 7. And people who apply for LinkedIn jobs are two and half times more likely to apply for a remote position rather than one where they have to work on site.
"That's an opportunity for our community because we've got tremendous bandwidth, and we're got a great place to live," Williams said.
Similar town hall meetings will be held in Victoria and Ellis.
"We'd like to think we're the best kept secret out there. And if we get more people to understand what we have to offer here, we can get more people to come and live here."
(Editor's note: Hays Post is owned by Eagle Communiations.)