Thanksgiving

I am very fortunate to have my son and his wife with us today on Thanksgiving.  We will have an opportunity to go to the Cowboy game today and be together as a family.  There is so much to be thankful for that I really don't know where to begin.  But I know that if I am thankful for the things that have been given to me, then I will be grateful for the other things that come my way. 


I hope that you are in a place in your life where you can reflect upon what has been provided to you and be thankful.  I know that life takes it's turns, and we just lost an extended family member this last week ourselves, but this is what the Lord had intended all along, and we pray that she is in a better place. 


I also wanted to be thankful for all of our men and women in uniform, who protect our liberties and freedoms, yet can't be with their family and loved ones on this Thanksgiving.  I wanted them to know just how important that I think they are, and how much I appreciate them and what they do.  I pray for their safe return to their loved ones and hope that they will be home for Christmas.  I guess it's hard to understand just how precious family is until you are on the other side of the world during the Holidays.  The Parker's are wishing you a very happy Thanksgiving, and I hope you are surrounded by your loved ones.

Finally a Senior Center on Pierce Birch

Yesterday in the afternoon session, Council finally made a decision to support a dedicated stand-alone Senior Center, or as some would prefer and Active Adult Center.  Now this didn’t come easy.  I would liken it to pulling molars.  But Lemuel Randolph, the Director of Parks and Recreation, was looking for direction on where and what to put on which piece of property.  The three properties were Pierce Birch off Green Oaks south of 303, Veterans Park on Arkansas, and Vandergriff Park along Center St..  Veterans Park was removed quickly because of size and access. 

I had to try and put two and two together and hopefully coming up with four.  It was decided through a brilliant display of deductive reasoning, that Council did in fact want a stand-alone Senior Center.  Due partly to the demographic results from the architects, it was decided that Pierce Birch would be the best and only site to accommodate a Senior Center.  Essentially Vandergriff was the only site to fit a Multi-Generational facility, due to its size and location.  So I simply stated that, “for the last 2 yrs. I have been trying to get support from this body for a stand-alone Senior Center.  Each of you has pledged your support to our seniors over this timeframe.   I am now asking for you to fill the void in our city services and provide 65,000 sq/ft of space in this 100 sq mile city, to programing a facility for our seniors.”  How could such eloquence go unnoticed?  I won’t go into the rest of my tirade, but essentially that got it done.  Mr. Randolph even got the message. 

I want to extend my gratitude to Elva Roy and the rest of the Ambassadors for Aging, for attending the afternoon meeting.  I can assure you that your presence was noticed, and you were the elephant in the room.  I would probably have been considered the Donkey, for lack of a better word.  Now we have our guidance and our land, and approval to commence design, all we need from here is money to fund the facilities.  Your persistence and participation will be required to pass a quarter cent sales tax in the Presidential Election in November 2016.