Community Connections: Laying the Groundwork

Many of you already know me, but for those who don’t, I am your new (returning) community developer. I have also been the director of the Postville Public Library for the past two years. I was the temporary community developer during the Community Heart & Soul Process when I came on in Nov 2022 as the project coordinator. When our project was completed in June 2024 the Community Heart & Soul team, city council, and most folks we surveyed agreed that we needed someone in town connecting the dots, and helping with our local business, community events, etc. Fast forward to November 2024 and here I am! 

One of the tasks I have been assigned is to improve communication between the city and residents, and so I will be doing a monthly column sharing about some of the projects we are working on. I have already been very active in sharing these things on social media, but I know that not all folks use or are comfortable with Facebook, Instagram, etc. (Side note: I highly recommend joining the Hometown to the World - Our Postville Community Group Facebook page. Even if it’s the only thing you do on Facebook, it’s worth it. It’s very active, there are over 1,500 folks in the group and local businesses are encouraged to advertise, people share upcoming events, news, all kinds of good stuff!) I will be sharing what we are up to in as many ways as possible, and I am also working on creating a system that works for our entire community to receive information from the city and the community development department. That is no small task in this town, but we’ll figure it out.

Today’s column is about something I am very excited about and that I believe will make a lot of our lives much easier. We are creating a bilingual volunteer database for the city of Postville and the surrounding communities. This idea came to me when I was volunteering at the mobile Guatemalan Consulate a couple months back, which relied heavily on volunteers. Many of those volunteers were begged to come help at the last minute. The event would not have been successful without the dozens of folks who helped make appointments at the library, and volunteered at the event itself. What if we had an established list of volunteers, and every time we had an event, all we had to do was send out one email to the whole list with the details of when, where, volunteer or paid, and what the tasks would be? The more folks we get on that list, the easier it will be to find someone who’s willing and able to help. This not only benefits the folks who need the service, but it also benefits the rest of us who feel frustrated that we can’t speak the language our customers, clients and patrons, speak. This will also help outside agencies, of which there are many, that serve our community. There are also paid opportunities that come up throughout the year, so this would also create jobs in town. 

Some examples of where this list could be helpful: VocRehab puts on a yearly career fair. Last year I acted as a translator for several people simply because I was there and my Spanish is rough. We should have had someone more qualified. Our food pantry is in desperate need of bilingual volunteers, and it can be hard to find someone willing to do it every week, but if there was a big list of folks, you’d be more likely to get someone to volunteer once a month and you could have a rotation. There are many great events throughout the year at the NEIAWRC, and having someone on hand at those events could be very helpful. Every year the library hosts VITA for low income tax prep and many of these folks, while able to speak English, don’t necessarily have the vocabulary to understand tax info (do any of us?) so having an interpreter on hand is crucial. And we know the community wants Taste of Postville back, having interpreters on hand for this event would be a key for its success. This is just a small sampling of the ways this could help all of us. 

My ask: if you know someone that is bilingual please ask if they would be willing to get added to the email list. There is no commitment, and I will not use their email for anything else. They will simply receive an email when we have an event coming up that would benefit from bilingual volunteers. We have a good amount of Spanish speakers but can always use more. We really need Somali, Hebrew, Ukrainian, Haitian Creole, French and any of the Mayan dialects. 

Contact me at ourpostvillechs@gmail.com, (563) 412-8777