Publisher's Pen - Hometown Heroes

Wednesday, September 23, 2020

We're in the midst of a global pandemic, but its impact on America’s communities is local. It has been a rough six months since our world as we knew it changed in March of 2020. Routines that were the backbone of our everyday lives took a curveball to the ribs that knocked the wind out of some of us in a business aspect, then had many of us scrambling to make some sort of sense out of our situations, and to figure out how this pandemic known as COVID 19 was going to affect us.

We have struggled with business, responsibilities and family needs, illnesses, and genuine concern not for just our families, but our friends and neighbors, that for some have been overwhelmed with having to make tough decisions that affected us almost instantly and continuously to date. Yet, through this all, we as a community have pulled together and worked as a team with compassion and teamwork like no other time I remember, other than when we as a nation were under attack or at war and, our community stepped up to support our Gunfighters and all military. To me, it seems as if we are at a type of war, battling a virus that we don’t understand or can see, know that it is a threat everywhere to whatever degree you personally feel, sometimes unsure in our convictions, or very sure on how we feel about the consequences, restrictions, and guidelines being set out from everywhere we look or read. WE are media here at the Mountain Home News and proud to be your local hometown newspaper, and with the flood of information that is submitted to us daily being so massive, the trying to filter out the muck and attempt to find information that is important to our readers, in an attempt to allow them to make informed decisions and choices on how it affects them each in business and personal choices in what we publish. WE believe an informed community is an educated community. We have seen additional resources for some, frustration, and heartbreak for others. It’s involved such a roller coaster of emotions and frustrations that we wanted to step aside from the information roller coaster and give a shout out to our local community Heroes along with the sponsoring advertisers within this week’s pull out tab. I honestly feel that we are surrounded by local heroes daily every year, but it was with these unprecedented times we saw the extra mile that many go to accommodate our day to day needs much less our emergencies. WE ARE TRULY A BLESSED COMMUNITY of those that were deemed essential from the very beginning, like us here at the paper, that was tasked like so many others to continue to get the job done on the front lines of keeping a community working and informed. I have been so thankful for the staff here at the Mountain Home News, and our ability to endure our circumstances, limit our chance of exposure with specific in-house protocol, and the partners we have formed to continue to bring news, events, and reporting to you in your weekly Mountain Home News. As Joy put together the Heroes Tab to honor our local heroes, I have been worried from the beginning that I might forget to mention just one sector, group, service provider, and all those that we are thankful for. I apologize now if I missed or left out someone that is an important hero to you and they are bountiful. Know that we honor them all and we acknowledge everyone. Among our Heroes are our military, and more specifically our neighbors at Mountain Home Air Force Base, our law enforcement for the city and the county, our first responders that include EMT, Fire, SAR, COP etc...our healthcare workers that include our doctors, nurses, aides, home health, hospice all the way down to the reception greeters at the doors, our school districts from admin to most importantly our teachers, that are dealing with the health and welfare of our youth “our children”, our city and county workers that kept our community up and running, our services providers that continued with the food delivery and drive-up service, our utility service workers, our grocery store workers, that ensure we had access to our daily essentials and all the stores and businesses in town that suffered through a shut down and were back up and running at the first opportunity, to provide additional shopping needs. All of these are our neighbors helping neighbors. Like many businesses affected by the pandemic, revenue has suddenly dropped off a cliff, but we continue to fight the battles and all our small businesses continue to the best of everyone’s ability. WE APPRECIATE YOU ALL AND HONOR YOUR CONTINUED EFFORTS AS THOSE AMONG US STEP UP, MANY SILENTLY, TO SUPPORT AND MAINTAIN OUR PHYSICAL AND SOCIAL WELL BEINGS TODAY AND EVERYDAY. On a personal note to our subscribers, you are also our heroes and we thank you for supporting our business. Remember as communities generously support their local businesses, we hope you will also consider the staff at your local newspaper and the vital work our newspaper does by subscribing to the paper in print or online.We are your neighbors —and we’ve got your back.

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