Dear Editor,
It is amazing to see how much has happened in Watonga in the 10 years that Lisa and I have lived here. There have been at least 20 businesses move to or build new facilities here in the last decade. The passage of 2 school bond issues, the last one by 73%, implies the community supports these school improvements and the school leadership to provide a quality education for their children. Watonga schools will be as good or better than any school in the state. These school improvements will attract top educators which will provide the base for the quality education our kids deserve. The school leadership has a vision for the education of our kids; my vision for this community is to bring in new businesses, build new homes and create good jobs. This means we need to look to the future and do all we can to create a community that these top educators and other people will move to and raise their families. I believe we all want our community to have jobs and opportunities that allows our kids to stay and raise their families.
One of the things we need to do to make our community a place people want to move to is to make it more attractive. A criticism of Watonga by people who travel through and by many people who live here is that it needs to be more appealing. We need to clean up certain areas of the community and tear down buildings that cannot be repaired. A fresh coat of paint can go a long way to making something more attractive and to me this includes our city properties. I believe the result of making our community more enticing is that people will want to raise their families here and businesses will want to locate here. This will improve our property values and possibly bring back businesses such as new and used car dealerships, equipment dealerships, and clothing stores. I truly believe this can happen, but it will take everyone working together to make the needed changes to improve Watonga. I believe that if we do not make our community more attractive, we will not see the improvements that will make our community grow and prosper. Let us unify and be optimistic about the future of our great City of Watonga!
Bill Seitter
Mayor