HUMANS OF NEWARK

Cherie Boyer, Newark, Ohio

I feel the Nework Space allows different people to work together, help one another, so that each person can be successful. That brings me joy. What concerns me? Safety. We have people, if they're spitting or have foul language or have an uncontrollable dog, that can impact people who are just walking along the sidewalk, that might just want to walk into a store. They themselves might be in a bad place, so you just don't know what's going on. You don't know if they're on drugs. You know that everybody can face tough times, but not everybody knows how to ask for help, nor do they want to ask for help. And there's a lot of systems that are trying to help people, but sometimes I think it can do both. It can help and hurt, and so it's not even knowing what to do.

Heather Shaw, Newark, Ohio

I love to see Newark coming into its own. I love to see new people coming in. I love to see new local businesses opening up and thriving. That's all really cool. I mean, it's so beautiful down here, and it's such a huge transformation from what it was just 10 years ago. And that's wonderful to see. I love, I love just walking around and seeing everything. But the flip side of that coin is, when cities thrive economically, the poorest tend to get pushed out. I see it every day I work downtown, I see people that are displaced, and know nothing seems to be coming down the pike that's going to help those people find places to live.

Andres DeArco, Columbus, Ohio

I'm from an Afro-Colombian background, so my ties are back to the Atlantic and Pacific coast of Colombia, and I'd say the resilience of our community gives me optimism. So I come from a town, a Palenque town, which means a town that's freed Africans, one of the first freed towns of escaped Africans, called Maria la Baja. And so I started this project selling coffee to create platforms for students in Columbia. I'm really proud of the fact that we come from a long line of people that have shown resistance, that have been able to create for their own. I've been able to do it through this coffee project that's been a direct tie in terms of, the profits go to scholarships for students in Colombia. If you're ever in Colombia, there's a lot of challenges, both at the state level and the local level, but people have been able to still make a way for themselves. I'm happy to be part of that tradition.

Bailey McCoy, Newark, Ohio

I'm excited by the development coming to our community, because it's kind of forced new business ideas and buildings of new, fun things for me to do with my kids. We also enjoy the farmers markets that are around and love the growing support for local foods and the great restaurants and vendors that we can support at the market and around town. I would love to know that everyone, at the end of the day, feels like they have somewhere where they belong in our community.

Rick Felumlee, Mayapple Farms, Dresden Ohio

We're in the food space, and we attend a lot of local farmers markets, it's really exciting to see the growth from what it has been, say, three or four years ago. It seems like a lot more people are opening up to the idea of getting their food locally, and, you know, recognizing the support that that means to the businesses. So that excites me to see the growth. But I think the development on the other side of Licking County, I know that's impacting a lot of our vendor friends and their their farms, personally. It's not impacting us yet [in Muskingum County]. I think eventually it probably will. But that's something recently that I've been thinking about a lot, how that's going to play out in a lot of different ways.

Lyle Linerode, Lancaster, Ohio

One of the things that I think about a lot is the diversity, or lack of diversity of thought—some people are so polarized that it just is frustrating. As a former speech and debate coach, where you have to look at both sides of the issue and look at the facts on both sides, I feel too many people are just looking at the facts on one side and ignoring the facts on the other side. And once they have their mind set up, they're totally oblivious to everything else. And to me, that's a big concern, especially with the younger generation coming up, because I know the kids I taught, a lot of them, would change their mind after seeing both sides of the issue, and I wish more adults would do that as well.