Pushing Through the Storm

If you've driven through a raging rain storm you know the feeling of gripping the steering wheel so tight your knuckles turn white. You strain to see through the rain hitting your windshield, between the sweeping arms of the windshield wipers. When you finally come out of the storm you can relax your grip on the steering wheel and begin to relax. But you can't take your eye off the road. You have to continue to move forward.

In February our raging rain storm was an extreme weather event that dropped temperatures to sub-zero levels for a week while natural gas prices jumped from less than $3 per unit to over $600 per unit. The combination resulted in our City of 1,800 residents facing a gas bill of more than $1.8 million for one month. That's a storm full of lightning, thunder, hail and high winds hitting you all at the same time.

Since then we've been able to come up with some financial solutions to help us recover for the economic blow we received in February. Today, it's time to start looking forward. That's exactly what I did today.

I took out a note pad and wrote down several construction projects taking place or getting ready to start in our community. The City has a $5.2 million electrical substation project underway right now. The Hospital is getting ready to start on $1.3 million in improvements. There are nine new housing units under construction right now totaling another $1.2 million. Moridge Manufacturing, The Grasshopper Company started on a 6,000 square foot addition to their building recently and we are in the middle of construction for a new community swimming pool. All of these projects combined total over $10 million in construction activity in our town of 1,800 residents.

We pushed through a pretty heavy storm this past month. We will pay the price for that for several years to come. But we need to stay focused on the road ahead of us and see all the great things in front of us.

Moundridge, Kansas- Where Community Is A Way of Life!