A community leader’s perspective on living in Jefferson County

09/06/2011 - Date of visit

I had a chance to talk to a community leader to gain their perspective on Jefferson County. This local leader described how the residents valued the “small town” feel and wanted to preserve the natural resources. She especially enjoyed the small town atmosphere; however, she did have a few concerns over the lack of commercial retailers. She felt that for any medium to large-scale purchase she would have to drive to Tallahassee.

She described the “From the Farm to the Table” initiative that was going on in the county. The farmers sell their produce in Monticello and throughout Northeastern Florida with an emphasis on buying local. She brought up the Watermelon Festival that was this past June, where between 3,000 to 5,000 people attended. This event was a yearly tradition, although the number of watermelon farmers dropped to a remaining few. She said the reason for the decrease in watermelon farmers was that the growing seasons were better in other parts of Florida.

Being a relative new resident, she couldn’t give me that much background other than what I already researched on the web. She did talk about the Opera House and Art Museum as being especially important to her as a resident. This past spring students from all the area schools came to the art gallery to display their artwork and to learn more about art history. An unofficial, on-going initiative that I thought was interesting was the search for informal cemeteries. She described how these cemeteries were overgrown and many were former slave cemeteries.

Lastly, I asked about the public school system and she described how the school was transitioning with a new administrator. She believed that the school district was working on a grant to help improve educational standards and test scores. She mentioned that the private school, Care Charter School of Excellence, was taken over by the Jefferson County School District last year. The kids were transferred over to the public school system and this caused some frustration among parents. I sensed that racial problems may have been carrying over in this school district as well.