Last year, the city of Harrison held a public ceremony complete with casket and a small plot beside city hall to bury its unfair, media-fueled and overblown reputation as a city of racists.
The funeral was attended by the NAACP and busloads of black Arkansas citizens who marched arm in arm with townsfolk from the Lyric Theater on the Harrison Square three blocks to City Hall where the reputation for racism was forever buried.
Know any other communities anywhere in our state that have gone to that trouble and even formed a task force promoting race relations? Me either.
As a native of this community, I've written time and time again that it's a town in the Ozark Mountains filled with fundamentally good and kindhearted people raised with values and a sincere regard for others.
Yes, in 1905, well before most people today were alive, a group of haters in Harrison did nearly eliminate its diverse population. And in the 1970s when Thom Robb, the ever-agitative leader of the Ku Klux Klan, settled in the hamlet of Zinc about 15 miles from Harrison, its image understandably took another hit.
Now, a high school group in this scenic city of 13,000 is utilizing the hashtag #IAm Harrison to help fight the stigma and misperceptions.
The project started in Harrison High School's community-service class, EAST, which uses social media to send accurate messages about Harrison and inspire positive changes.
As with anything worthwhile, what began as an idea and hopes of attracting at least 700 to its Facebook page, We Are Harrison AR, now has over 2,000 followers. Pretty amazing, isn't it, the information social media can spread?
A KTHV story recently quoted several students involved in this impressive effort.
Sophomores Kim Sloane and Houston Strode seemed to best represent the feelings of students involved in providing this unique opportunity for the town to speak and express thoughts and feelings about tolerance and treating others with respect.
"I am Harrison because I love diversity. I am Harrison because I love all people. I am Harrison and this is my voice," said Houston.
"I love art, music, and books and I am passionate about all people. I am Harrison," said Kim.
"I think we were shocked by how many people were ready to talk about this. How many people have been waiting," Kim added. "We want them to know that there are people here who are loving who will accept them no matter who they are."
Heartwarming, isn't it, that these young people back home have seen fit to create a voice that expresses open and receptive hearts for other?
Favoring firefighters
Late firefighter Harold "Bud" Planchon of Fayetteville has got to be smiling from his perch on a cloud.
State Rep. Greg Leding, a Democrat from Fayetteville, has introduced a bill with Planchon and others in mind that would benefit hundreds of cancer-stricken Arkansas firefighters.
Planchon was a much-loved and respected Springdale firefighter who died in 2014 from adenocarcinoma, a virulent form of colon cancer recognized in 33 states as one of the many work-associated cancers that more often afflict firefighters because of their frequent contact with diesel fumes and burning chemicals. He lived with the cancer for five years after being diagnosed in 2009.
I join a large number of Arkansans in praising Leding for introducing this legislation that can't possibly be construed as partisan. The state's Professional Fire Fighters Association has been lobbying since 1997 for these protections and potential benefits to victims' families.
I'd like to believe we live in one of the nation's more humane states. As such, I hope the Legislature and people of Arkansas will support this important bill and the intent behind it. It's enough that we ask our firefighters and police to put their lives on the line with every call.
It pushes well past the pale to ask them and their families to risk losing their loved one to an insidious cancer that slowly siphons away their lives without stepping forward to show our collective gratitude.
Arkansas needs to display its potential for compassion by passing Leding's noble bill into law.
Dwindling officials
The list of top officials in besieged little Tontitown dwindled by one name the other day after the community's 32-year-old recorder-treasurer was arrested on charges of theft of property and services.
Tontitown's council appointed Alicia Collins to the job in 2013, along with a side job as the town's bookkeeper. All together, those public positions paid her yearly compensation of about $49,000. You'd have thought that was adequate, wouldn't ya?
But if these charges prove valid and she is convicted, that obviously wasn't enough. Washington County sheriff's investigators charged Collins with stealing more than $25,000. They didn't say how much more. Plus they say she also marked her water and sewer bills as having been paid when they hadn't.
I suspect this latest drama will grow even larger as investigators continue analyzing city records (finally!) while City Hall remained closed last week.
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Mike Masterson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at mikemasterson10@hotmail.com.
Editorial on 02/21/2015