A new community group focused on alleviating poverty in Clearview Township, while fostering and developing community spirit is hosting the Stayner Fall Festival.
It is one of the first initiatives of the newly formed Clearview Community Outreach. The organization’s executive director is Clayton Culham, an associate pastor at Clearview Community Church. The outreach group is a project of the church community but is its own entity.
“It allows us to do the goodwill stuff we want to do but it allows us to do it a bit easier and not as a religious institution,” said Culham.
The first task of Clearview Community Outreach is to complete an informal community needs assessment and members have been meeting with community leaders to learn more about the issues.
“The needs assessment is to help us make an educated decision on what our programs and services will be and how we can do it in a smart way… if we are just treating a symptom of the larger issue and not a root cause then we are not really doing long-term effective programming, we are just doing crisis management. There is a place for crisis management but there is also a place for preventative programs and things that get to the source of the problems and root issues and work on those to see things change,” said Culham
About one-third into the assessment, he said there is an awareness of poverty issues in Clearview but there is a lack of knowledge of the services in the area.
“It’s kind of a communication breakdown between who needs it and who is helping,” said Culham.
The festival, he said, aims to drum up community spirit and raise awareness about Clearview Community Outreach.
“It’s an opportunity to treat our community to a fun day of activities and fun stuff. We are doing our best to appeal to every age demographic,” said Culham. “If we can develop connections with Clearview Community Outreach and the community and for people to build relationships and friendships then we are doing okay”.
The Stayner Fall Festival takes place at Stayner Bible Conference Grounds from 12:30 p.m. until about 7 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 20. Admission is free.
There will be games, lazer tag, a bouncy castle, live music, crafts, balloon animals and a build-your-own scarecrow activity.
Magician Sawyer Bullock will be performing at 1 p.m. At 2 p.m. there will be a celebrity soccer game vs Stayner Collegiate Institute and a basketball tournament at 4 p.m.
Stayner Bible Conference Grounds is located at 240 Scott St.