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When I approached the small but mighty communication team for Weld County in the spring of 2019, I challenged them, and myself, with this task: find a meaningful way to answer two questions. First, what does county government do? Second, why should taxpayers care?
The answer came after a six-month process of drafting stories that pulled back the curtain on county government and showcased (in a brief yet engaging way, we hope) what county employees do every day for county residents. Believe it or not, there’s a lot of great stuff happening in each of the county departments, and there are a lot of wonderful employees working hard to ensure the services provided to residents are the best they can be.
So why did it take six months for us to just draft a few stories? Honestly, it can be a struggle to make government interesting to people who aren’t used to thinking about county government and government projects. Oh, I know what you’re thinking, “I think about government every time I hit a pothole on the road, or when I have to stand in line at the Motor Vehicle Department, or when I have to pay my property taxes.” But we didn’t want that to be the only time you thought about what your local government was working on. In fact, we wanted to create a platform to share with you how the county prioritizes and budgets for road projects, how the county is looking into new technology that will help shorten the line at Motor V, and how your property tax dollars are put to work for you as a resident.
We also wanted to use the platform to share with you how the Weld County Department of Human Services helped a 24-year-old single man through his journey from fostering two teenage boys to becoming their adoptive father. We wanted to highlight the hard work of a Weld County Deputy who lost his leg in a life-altering illness but worked hard to earn his place back in the department; and the wasps that our Public Works team uses to naturally fight off noxious weeds; and the time our GIS department taught local students about mapping and emergency response through a zombie apocalypse scenario; and the progress of the repairing of our county’s official fossil – Pops.
So, for 50 issues, we have worked to tell the story of county government, and for 50 issues, the public has responded positively! And believe me, there is no greater feeling than knowing that people are receptive, and dare I say appreciative, of the information. In fact, as of last week, our County Roots newsletter subscribers topped 3,574 and it continues to grow.
So, a small but mighty idea turned into an e-newsletter, published by a small but mighty team of communicators, has been truckin’ along (and earning a pretty prestigious award along the way for our high open rate) and gaining steam.
We appreciate everyone who has subscribed to this project for continuing to spend a few minutes every other week learning about county government. And we will work hard to continue to bring you informative and engaging articles that keep you in the loop on what county government is doing and why you, as a taxpayer, should care.
Here’s to the next 50!
By Jennifer Finch, Weld County Public Information Officer
Correction in the July 26 story: There was an error in this story identifying a new North Range facility in southern Weld County. The new counseling center is located in Frederick not Firestone as was first published. The facility houses the Counseling Center at Carbon Valley and The Crisis Resiliency Center. Our apologies for the error.
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