First You Need A Passion

The Little Girl from Emporium has a passion for her hometown.

FIRST YOU NEED A PASSION

Do not let the word "Mentors" in our name put you off.  Hometown Mentors, in the mind of the founder are people still living in Emporium, as well as those who lived there at one time and now live elsewhere in the world, but maintain a heart for Cameron County, nonetheless.

All these "mentors" have a certain passion for their hometown.

Where there is a PASSION for a worthwhile cause, and there is a WILL to create a nonprofit to benefit that passion, there is a WAY for the nonprofit to become reality.

It takes at least one person to act on that passion and BEGIN to create a nonprofit corporation.  If no one moves to begin a plan, they may forever say, "Someday I'm going to....." or "I wish I had...." and the opportunity may slip by without the nonprofit 501(c)3 ever coming into fruition.

"Begin", they say, "the rest is easy".

So, remember, the first thing to have, when starting a nonprofit, is a huge passion for a worthwhile cause.  The first thing "to do" is to make a business plan and run it like a business, not a hobby.

Passion, as defined by Miriam Webster, is: "a strong liking or desire for or devotion to some activity, object, or concept".  

Passion is also defined as: "the sufferings of Christ between the night of the Last Supper and His death", as well as, "sexual desire".

So, as you can see, the word passion has very strong connotations.

If not for an absolute passion for my hometown, it's people and my parents, Hometown Mentors, Inc. (HMI) would never have come in to reality.  Frankly, creating a not for profit, or as I prefer a "FOR PURPOSE" organization is way too much work, unless you have that drive and passion.

My passion for the cause was so strong that when I talked about HMI and what we wanted to create for Emporium, it was as if a soap box magically appeared and plopped down in the center of the room.

I would take my stance on top of that pedestal and begin spouting off.  The speech would go on and on, as long as the listener would allow.  Usually, the listener nodded in agreement with my speech, giving me more confidence and so the words would get faster and faster and the speech went longer and longer while my voice got louder and louder.

Even though I knew in my mind what I wanted, the total concept did not come out of my mouth in an organized fashion to let others know the totality of the vision.

Have you ever wanted something so badly, but you were afraid to start it because you knew if you started it, that it might fail?

I just could not get it all down on paper.  There was the desire to encourage the current residents of Emporium that they were not alone in this world.

Then, there was the desire to encourage the students that there were many opportunities in the world for them.  Others had learned various careers and whatever the student wanted to do in life, we could find a mentor with the same small town background that could lead them along a path.  This path from school to a successful career would be much shorter if there was someone who had already taken the long route with all the pitfalls and mistakes.

Then, there was a desire to help get more technology into the area.  Many many people, by this time, were using computers and the Internet every day.  This was not the case in rural areas of the country.  Much of that had to do with the lack of reliable bandwidth to keep your computer on the Internet.  Also, people had to teach themselves how to use a computer and the Internet, due to the lack of training in that area.

There was also the desire to help older people maintain their independence longer by putting an easy to use video call device in homes of the elderly in Emporium.  The idea was that, eventually, it could be connected to emergency services and their families that lives hundreds, if not thousands of miles away.  Staying connected is important to the state of mind and independent thinking.

I saw a huge potential that this nonprofit could go state wide.... NATION WIDE!  It was while looking at how much work must go into the formation of a corporation and the 40 page application to actually be certified as a nonprofit, where I lost confidence that it could be done.

There was another reason that I was dragging my feet.  I had owned a retail store in the 1970's and 80's that failed miserably, in the end.  The LAST thing I wanted to do was to start another business.  There had to be another way to help Emporium, I thought, but for the life of me, I couldn't find a way to bring funds into this small town without forming a 501(c)3 charity and I certainly did not have the financial wherewithal to do that.
But I did have the passion.

I believed that there was a good amount of grant money sitting in the coffers of the state and federal government. Foundations and corporations also have monies available to assist rural communities and places where the population is under-served.  Emporium and Cameron County are definitely under-served by the government because of the small population base.

There are many people, whose faces are forever young in my minds eye, with whom I had gown up and who learned perseverance and integrity (character) while living in Emporium.  These people had gone on in life to make a name for themselves.  They also have a love/passion for their hometown.  Surely, these people would like to help and give back to this worthy cause.

The idea was that these people might be willing to give donations to a nonprofit that would have a focus on bettering their hometown and encouraging her in to the future with projects like gardens in town or playgrounds or sponsoring the recognition of our past teachers and group mentors?

Government grants, as well as foundations, require an entity to have a 501(c)3 nonprofit status to apply for most grants.  Therefore, if we were to bring grant money in to Cameron County, then we had to have the nonprofit corporation certification.

We also needed the charity status from the IRS in order for people to receive an income tax deduction on larger donations, over $250.  I had some work experience working with boards of directors in for-profit corporations, during my career in administration, and the wheels in my head just kept turning round and round on how to get some of this grant money in to Emporium/Cameron County.

The first step was an experimental project that would set up the manor in which HMI might work, going into the future.  We found a project right away that used volunteers to design and build meter box covers that would be placed on parking meters in Emporium during the holiday - no pay season.

Through a conversation with the Cameron County Chamber of Commerce, we found they had been trying for a couple years to find a more decorative replacement for the plastic bags on the meters downtown.  She envisioned wooden boxes to cover the parking meters that would be durable enough, not to blow away and that could be used for a number of holiday seasons.

This was my first "something" for Hometown Mentors to "fix".

For the solution, I called my most beloved "hometown mentor" and my "go to guy" for anything I've dealt with in life ... My Dad.  So, I guess you can say that Ken Ostrum was THE first official member/stakeholder in Hometown Mentors, Inc. (HMI) ever!

We talked about the problem and, being a retired electrical engineer from Sylvania, he began his "problem solving".  Problem = wooden box cover design, requiring measurements of the subject meters to find the right sizing for the wooden boxes.  He suggested the second hometown mentor, Ken Byrns.

Step One:  DESIGN... We contacted Ken Byrns, a long time friend of my Dad, who said that he was on his way out of town, but could take the measurements and make the design when we got home.  However less than three hours later, we had a draft design, on paper, for a box that would cover both the one and two headed meters in down town Emporium.  The project had merit and now had a place to begin.

Step Two:  CUTTING THE WOOD... We contacted my old science teacher, the Late Calvin Hugar, because his hobby was woodworking and we thought that he would have the tools and knowledge to choose the wood and cut the pieces to be assembled.  Ken Byrns had also counted the meters and there were over 100 boxes needed to complete the project.

Step Three: PURCHASING WOOD... Since HMI literally had no treasury, we paid for the wood with a donation of $188 from my Dad.  HMI later paid it back.  Mr. Hugar cut the plywood into five or six pieces, as per the design. These covers were able to lock into place so that it would make it harder to be vandalized.  He did this labor at no cost.

Step Four:  ASSEMBLY... A fourth hometown mentor volunteered to assemble the boxes as a community service project.

Step Five:  DECORATING... By this point, our project had become known around Emporium and the Chamber hosted "family painting parties".  Some of you will remember that the pictures on each box were "coloring book" picture outlines stenciled on the boxes.  Families and any member of the community were invited to paint them, then they would be water proofed and the borough crew installed them on the meters.

This first Hometown Mentors project was "in the books" and it did exactly what I had envisioned.

The project itself brought the whole town together to accomplish "something" and it was fun. The meter boxes even made the pages of the local newspaper, The Cameron County Echo and many of the painters took credit for their work by signing their meter box for posterity sake.

It has been many years since the meter boxes were made and they only lasted a few years because we made an error and did not seal/waterproof them as well as we should have.  We should have done maintenance on them after each seasonal use, but we didn't.  These are lessons learned.

What a wonderful memory this is for the history of Hometown Mentors.  It also proves that Hometown Mentors are NOT people coming in to town trying to teach or change anything.  Hometown Mentors are those people in Emporium, or not, who see a need and who band together to fix the problem that needs fixed.

You see, the highest degree that I have, is a high school diploma from Cameron County High School.  As it turns out, that's the only degree I ever needed in life and in order to create this corporation. 

It was a passionate heart for my hometown that started the brain thinking.  

Following posts, will show other wonderful-fun projects where Hometown Mentors, Inc. began to shine in Emporium and Cameron County.

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