Allerton, IA

Pam Vaughn has agreed to be one of the 9 board members of the initial Wayne County Housing Trust Fund.  There have been several residents of Allerton helping with the steps to organize this service for the community.  Approval by the Iowa Finance Authority will allow the group to apply for funding from the state of Iowa to address the housing needs of low-income residents of the county.  A housing assistance plan is under development and articles of incorportation and by-laws will be approved at the next meeting.

As a board, we have asked the sub committees to report every so often (every 3 months).  We asked this from each group because we want to see involvement from everyone at all times.  We do not want to see something started and not get finished.  We are working on a paper process for committees to fill out to monitor what money will be used for  what - they will also have to report in every so often on their progress. 

At the begining of December, our town experienced a terrible ice storm that knocked out over 90% of the power in town and in the country. This stormed tore down trees all over blocking ways in and out of homes. Members of the Horizon group along with members of the Allerton Fire Department and First Responders took it upon themselves to go literally door to door throughout the whole town and country doing well checks at least twice a day. Many people were without power for 2-3 days. With the approval of the city council, one of the town’s buildings was made available for people to stay. Volunteers came to the building and prepared breakfasts, lunches and dinners. Each night, there were at least 2 members from this team that stayed away from their home to spend the night with the families that were staying up town. With the information provided by Wayne county’s Emergency Management Coordinator, this team was able to provide information to lower income families of how to get assistance to repair power boxes that were torn away from their houses.

I believe that this is what Horizons is all about. Going out of your way to comfort someone else, to come together in a time of need, being neighborly to someone that you haven’t met before, checking in on elderly people-even though each time you do they refuse the help but are always glad to know that someone is watching out for them.

In one study circle, it was mentioned that it doesn’t seem like there are too many town people that attend the city council meetings. It was asked if no one cared what is going on in the town or if people simply didn’t know about it. Many people in this group, said that they didn’t know when or where it was held. Now that the people in that group discussed where the adjenda was located at, there have been more town members attending the city council meetings.

Two Horizon team members took it upon theirselves to step forward and take leadership by running for the city council . One of these two members was recently elected and was just sworn in this month.

Members from different circle groups have come together to start to form a non profit group “Friends of Allerton”. Actions that have been taken include: establishing “Friends of Allerton”, electing board members, setting bylaws and identifying their mission statement-
Our purpose is to identify and act upon ideas to reduce the impact of poverty in the community of Allerton. The goal is to be the central location for the sub-committees (Communication committee, Garden committee, Resource Day committee, and Pantry committee) to come to for future funding, which would be approved or disapproved by the board and also to have other members of the community to step forward and become active in their attempt to reduce poverty in Allerton. Some ideas that have been mentioned are to have a Fun Day at the Allerton ball field each month that would get families to interact with each other and to have a movie night up town that would allow families to have a night out.   A grant application has been developed that requests those who are applying for assistance to demonstrate how the project addresses poverty and how low-income individuals are involved.  The grants require matching in-kind or grant funds from community or outside sources.  Friends of Allerton is still in a work of progress, but it is coming along nicely.

Allerton Horizon’s has started taking action to help reduce poverty by forming working groups from the study circles (each group has a cross representation of community members who are actively involved)of the following:

Communication committee-This committee was developed with the thought that there are a lot of times when things are going on in the community that a lot of people are not aware of. This committee got donations to build a sign. The committee decided that this sign would most benefit people if they could hang signs and flyer’s on it instead of spending the extra money that they didn’t have to go around and hang up signs or pay for their ad in the paper. This project is not completed yet. They are hoping to raise ,more money to put a roof on it so the weather does not damage it. It is available for anyone to put their announcement on it at this time.

Resource Day- The resource day committee was developed because there was a group of Horizon team members that wanted to make a difference by offering the community their knowledge of different items. This committee has already had a resource day for the town. This consisted of bringing in different organizations for people to be more aware of what assistance is out there, whether it be for medications, doctors, electric or gas bills, or any other assistance that they may profit from. The Allerton Fire Department also allowed this committee to use their station to change the oil in vehicles for free-they had to purchase their own filter and oil- for people who couldn’t afford it at the time. People who had this done had the opportunity to watch and learn. This was a success for the first go a round.  The group is now working on establishment of a resource center located in the entry of the Centennial Building just outside of the library.

Pantry- The pantry committee was developed by Horizon team members who had the same idea that there are a lot of children and adults in the community that may not be able to afford new clothing. Or someone my have a disaster happen to them and they may need to use some clothing for awhile. This committee has asked for donations and they have received many!! There motto is “Pay it Forward”-meaning if you do something for someone in the community -such as mowing their yard, changing a light bulb, getting their mail for them-or simply doing something good for the town, then you will be rewarded with something from the pantry. There was talk that sometime in the future they would like to have a permanent location and also would like to become a food and clothing pantry.

Community Garden- The community garden was set up to have the elderly be mentors for students by teaching the students gardening skills. The students that participated in this activity helped plant, grow and sell the vegetables from these gardens. This gave the community a chance to purchase this wonderful food. This was a good activity that got the younger generation together with the older generation.