By Liz Baker

How blessed we are to live in such a vibrant, growing town! Everywhere you look houses are being built. On Main Street and Dickinson Blvd., new businesses are sprouting. Our downtown business district is renovating, rebuilding, and reviving.

Last week we were asked to encourage and celebrate small businesses in our city: the repair shops, construction companies, insurance companies, energy companies large and small. We celebrated the clothing stores, salons, restaurants, and bars. We appreciate and believe in these businesses that are so rooted in our community.

Part of this is due to thoughtful, forward-looking city and county government that looks to rebuild, renew, and extend our infrastructure– our physical foundation. With this thoughtfulness and vision for the future, local government creates a safe, attractive, and modern atmosphere that promotes and supports both small and large businesses which in turn provide products, services, and employment necessary to rural, small-town life.

We celebrate the growing prosperity of our small businesses and the services they provide for our citizens, especially after the last few years of economic blight. But I would also ask that our business community remember a part of the community that helped these businesses get started, provided seed money and encouragement, worked loyally for these businesses, and patronized these businesses.

Our elderly citizens, our poor citizens, and our children are not recovering from the pandemic lockdown and the withering of our economic conditions. People who thought they had planned for their future saw and are still seeing the fruits of their labor disappear. Because we live in a rural area, they are no longer able to receive the medical care they need. Basic food items have become out of reach. The cost for utilities is skyrocketing.

Too many of our children eat only two small meals a day, Monday through Friday. Their caretakers, often single parents or grandparents, have trouble providing adequate evening and weekend meals for them. Food insecurity affects intellectual development, behavior, and stamina. In this small town, these are a small business’s future employees.

Too many of our citizens fell into alcoholism, drug abuse, and mental illness. This causes a rise in crime and a loss of safety in our community. Drug and alcohol abuse leads to higher rates of domestic violence, homelessness, and disease. This affects businesses directly through theft, vandalism, and safety concerns for their customers.

Just as the citizens of Fort Stockton are asked to celebrate and support small businesses in Fort Stockton, I’m calling on small businesses to return that support and complete that cycle of growth that helps the city as a whole.

I’m calling on small businesses in Fort Stockton to adopt one of the several charities in Fort Stockton that support the citizens that have supported our small businesses throughout the years. I’m asking ALL businesses in Fort Stockton to financially sponsor and donate an amount of money, small or large, each month to the local charity of their choice.

Dear local businesses, please help support the people who have supported you throughout the years, and who will become your future employees and customers.