KIRKSVILLE, MO. -- Kirksville received a special award for community betterment for the city's efforts in economic development and improving quality of life for residents.
Kirksville was recently honored at the Missouri Community Betterment Conference in Jefferson City.
Several community volunteers put together a presentation for judges showcasing recent accomplishments that improve the community.
“Kirksville has been involved with community betterment for a number of years. We had been rather inactive for a couple of years but we decided it was time to get ourselves back in action and so we were very pleasantly surprised when we received first place this year because of the projects that we submitted,” said Community Betterment Committee Co-Chair Harriet Beard.
Some of those projects included Highway 63, the Kirksville Arts Center, the DNA lab, Wi-Fi Sensors, and the community’s reaction to help each other after the tornado in may.
“We did document that we had plenty of these projects has started because of our improvement with the strategic plan. We also know it's time to update that so we're going to alert the community right now that it's time for action. And we need to come up with some new ideas of things that need to be accomplished in the community,” said Beard.
Beard says the committee will continue to listen to the community and what's important to its residents.
Kirksville was in Category VI with other communities of its size including Boonville, Cameron, Clinton and Moberly.
Members of the Chamber of Commerce Community Betterment Committee say it's their ability to pull together to achieve goals that won them the award.
“The reason the judges said they particularly chose Kirksville as first place was because of the cooperation among all of the entities in Kirksville, the city, A. T. Still, Truman, all the volunteer groups, the downtown area, the Chamber of Commerce, KREDI,” said Community Betterment Committee Co-Chair Annette Sweet.
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