I was invited onto the Board of CATCH by the President, Rosemary Heard, back in April 2018. Back then, having a representative from the City of Concord as part of the board family made sense given the continuing cross collaboration the organization has with the City. I was also pleased to join the then newly formed community relations committee under the direction of Erin and this year saw the launch of a new fundraising event – the CATCH Masquerade Ball. I think it was the last public event in the whole of NH to be held before the social distancing directive came into place and I really hope this is on the schedule for next year because those of us who could attend really did have a ball!!
In both my professional and personal life, I see Concord as my home and I am proud of it. I want it to be the best it can be not just for me but those around us. Housing plays such a huge part in any of our lives. Having a home which is affordable to your income is so important and being part of an organization which helps to make this happen is paramount to any community and to me.
Personally I’m a great supporter of anything local, such as buy local from our farms or retail stores or local charities especially anything animal related such as the Pope Memorial SPCA. These institutions need our help more now than anytime we have known and that also includes CATCH.
Right now, in the midst of COVID-19, the leadership of the City is doing so much behind the scenes to keep essential services going and I applaud my City leadership for that. For me, I am working with partners such as the Chamber of Commerce and InTown Concord, to help our companies find financial help lines especially from the federal funding streams and access to webinars via the Chamber of ‘how to’ videos.
In a closing note, we also need to make sure we take good care of ourselves too. Our mental state of mind is probably being challenged more right now than it ever has been. Someone cited that it felt like they were ‘grieving’ for a lifestyle lost in all of this chaos. So many things we took for granted now probably seem so alien to us now. But I have taken this opportunity to re-evaluate what is important to me and the causes I care about of which CATCH is up there in my top five.