By Bob Strohm
bstrohm@wbcowqel.com

Former Ohio State running back Maurice Clarett served as the keynote speaker at Tuesday’s Crawford: 20/20 Vision State of the Vision event at Galion Free Methodist Church. But Clarett wasn’t the only one who went to the microphone during the evening. (See related story for Clarett’s remarks)

During his speech to the attendees, Dave Williamson explained the history and background of the movement.

“We need to know how we got where we got. In 2004 individual communities began to talk, and that is eventually what turned into Crawford: 20/20 Vision,” Williamson said. “The purpose of 20/20 is that Crawford County was dying, if you don’t believe look at the stats, we had 30-plus years of declining population and declining wage, as well as a drug problem. To address the decline the community wrote wrote and you helped underwrite, and now we’re constantly improving the action steps.”

Williamson went further and looked where 20/20 is in its planning stages.

“We still have a lot of work to do. I believe we have made a lot of progress, but remember this community like a lot of Ohio has been in decline for 30 or 40 years, and so I think the issue is picking up the pace and  –  can we sustain the pace?” Williamson asked. “I think it is a marathon more than a sprint, and we have to be able to sustain the pace, but we have to have more people involved doing the good work. It is a work in progress.”

Awards were given during Tuesday’s dinner. Executive Director of Crawford County United Way Amber Wertman was presented with Emerging Leader of the Year, Pastor Mike Corwin was awarded Persevering Leader of the Year, and Hord Livestock was recognized as Organization of the Year.

After awards were presented, Robin Hildebrand returned chairmanship of the Vision Committee to Anne Cole who had taken a tempoary leave for a portion of her term.

Volunteers for Crawford: 20/20 Vision were recognized during the evening as well with the Vision Cup going to the Leadership Development Team, Buckethead of the Year was presented to Doug Leuthold, and Margie Maddox was recognized as Individual Making the Most Impact.

Steve Crall and Joe Kleinknecht led a business meeting of the Crawford County Education and Economic  Development Partnership.Board members re-elected the board of directors and officers were elected and passed a number of bylaws.