City needs citizens to help make our community better

What is community? One definition for community is “a group of people living together in one place, especially one practicing common ownership.” When Poplar Bluff and Butler County experience a disaster such as the ice storm of 2009 or floods, everybody seems to step up to the plate and we all work together as a community to help each other. I’m sure most other communities do the same but we like to think we are exceptional and I think we are.

Over the past several years Poplar Bluff and Butler County have seen a tremendous growth in retail businesses. Once again we have become a retail hub for Southeast Missouri and Northeast Arkansas. We are seeing many new neighborhoods developed just outside the city limits of Poplar Bluff. But inside the city some of the neighborhoods are on the decline. I grew up on Lester Street just a block up from Kneibert Clinic. It’s not a bad neighborhood now but like many other neighborhoods in town it isn’t like it was in the ’60s and ’70s.

People have changed, people don’t seem to care anymore. I can remember Lester Street as a tree lined street with well-kept yards and well-kept houses. Now it’s a different story all over town. Rundown houses, trash in yards, cars parked in what used to be a nice lawn. City government can be blamed for some of the decline by not taking care of sidewalks and other infrastructure and not enforcing codes the way it should but government cannot be the solution for everything. Property owners could make a difference just by taking a little more pride in ownership. It doesn’t take long to pick up trash laying in the yard just that alone makes a big difference in a neighborhood.

A few months ago the city started a bulky item pickup for city residents. This is designed for people that have large items their trash hauler cannot pick up. Items such as refrigerators, washers and dryers and old mattresses. You can have up to four items for a cost of $20. The city does this the second Monday of every month. All you have to do is stop by City Hall in the collector’s office and they will take care of you.

The City has also started an Adopt-A-Street Program. Although we haven’t publicized this much we will be making a strong push for this program in early spring.

Our planning department has been working on a grant for demolition of old dilapidated houses. The street department is working with the planning department on a grant for paving gravel streets in the low to moderate income areas of the city. The street department is also making a strong effort in paving some of the other gravel streets in town and they have also started reconstructing sidewalks in some of the older neighborhoods. Take a drive down Victor Street just off of Ditch Road and see what they have done. It’s not a lot but it’s a start and in three to five years you will see a big difference.

Code Enforcement has stepped up its enforcement. Just in the last few weeks they have ticketed and had removed unlicensed derelict vehicles in residential neighborhoods. This will continue. They have also been working with the salvage yards to clean up in front of their businesses. This is something that the city has worked on for years, and hopefully the salvage yards will cooperate.

This is a great community we live in. It’s not owned by your local government. It’s owned by all of us that live and work here. We are all in this together, let’s work together to make it a better place by cleaning up our properties and helping our neighbor clean theirs.

Jeremiah 2:7, “And I brought you into a plentiful land to enjoy its fruits and its good things. But you came in, you defied my land and made my heritage an abomination.”

Let’s take care of what God has loaned us.

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Mark Massingham served as finance director for the City of Poplar Bluff from 1990-2014. He was appointed to the position of city manager in July 2015. He has been married to Paula for 25 years and they have three grown children.