I hesitated when I was first asked to share my story and stories from my community.
And by hesitated, I mean I came to a full stop. I thought it over for several months before I committed.
It should’ve been an easy answer. I love to write. I love Caswell County. I’ve always told the stories of this place I call home. I started writing for The Caswell Messenger in 2003, spending five years as “the newspaper lady,” covering local government and making sure my neighbors had the information they needed to participate in local decision-making.
I featured their triumphs and their sorrows, creating a record of their lives.
I left the newspaper in 2008 because there never seemed to be enough hands to meet the need. I wanted to do more than just tell the story – I wanted to help create a better ending. I spent the next four years in the trenches – working as an EMT for our county’s EMS, coordinating a free tax assistance site, and convening community partners to consider how we could better work together to provide more opportunities for Caswell residents.
In 2012, I joined the leadership staff of our community health center. I spent the next six years studying clinical outcomes, accreditation standards, and evidence-based practices. I was behind a desk, converting mountains of data into pie charts and action plans. It felt like a break from the chaos, and I happily hid in my climate-controlled office.
I maintained my connection to the community through our patients, listening to them share their experiences and their needs.
All those spreadsheets and colorful graphs offered a new way to tell their stories. I witnessed the same storylines so often that they’ve become universal, but I remember each of their voices.
In 2018, the community secured private foundation funding to launch the Caswell chapter of The Health Collaborative, a regional effort launched in Danville, Va., in 2014. The city had gone through 10 years of extensive redevelopment efforts, but leaders worried it would be difficult to attract new industry when the local workforce had such poor health outcomes.
Community partners came together to turn those conversations into action, and by 2018 they were firmly committed to creating the structure and space efforts that would lead to a healthy Dan River Region where everyone thrived. I’ve been working with them since that time, and I’m now the regional director.
There are great people doing great things in Caswell County, and I love telling others about the tenacity and innovation demonstrated when they work together to overcome the challenges we face.
I also enjoy sharing our history, as sordid as some of it may be. It offers so much context to help us understand how we got to where we are today and where we need to go tomorrow.
Why did I hesitate?
I had to consider the potential fallout. When we speak the truth, it can make others uncomfortable. The truth can expose flaws or weaknesses and raise issues or concerns folks prefer not to acknowledge. Being too vocal could anger powerful people and jeopardize funding, partnerships, or status.
The work of The Health Collaborative is powered by partnership and our ability to connect across differences. It’s too important to risk.
But I believe our silence creates even greater risk.
This IS the work.
There are a lot of people yelling about a lot of things, but there’s still no one listening to people in places like Caswell County. Here in this economically distressed county of just under 23,000 people, our stories and conversations are similar to other rural areas around the state and the country.
In North Carolina, 78% of our counties are considered rural. The General Assembly might be located in Raleigh, but you’ll need to take more than a few country backroads to find most of the real seats of power.
You can’t truly understand North Carolina without first understanding places like Caswell County.
I’m eager to share our experiences with you in the hope that you’ll use what you learn about us and our story to help you write a happy ending for your own community.
Many are wringing their hands, expressing uncertainty as to how we ended up so divided as a nation. Those of us from places like Caswell County aren’t surprised. We’ve seen this coming. We saw it happen here first.
We’re the ones who can tell this story. And we have some pretty good ideas on how we can get out of this mess and build communities where we all thrive.
Shannon Moretz is the Regional Director of The Health Collaborative, working to advance health equity in the rural South, particularly in the Dan River Region. This column is syndicated by Beacon Media and is available to republish for free on all platforms under Beacon Media’s guidelines.
