Plus our pluses

July 19, 2016

Washington, Iowa

To the Editor:

Several years ago an individual by the name of Ray Pugh was the guest speaker at an annual dinner here in Washington. Mr. Pugh was the executive director of the Des Moines YMCA at Boone. He was also an outstanding motivation speaker. The speech that he gave that night was an excellent presentation that Washington Community residents would find very fitting to consider at this time. A synopsis of that presentation goes something like this. ?Washington, you have an outstanding community. As I toured your town when I arrived this afternoon, I see so many positives ? schools, parks, business areas, hospital, retirement homes, YMCA, recreation areas.? He stated that we had so many pluses as a community. His suggestion to us, as a community, is to plus our pluses and build on your positives. Don?t let the negative elements control your future, get away from the negatives and plus your pluses. The thought of pulsing your pluses has stuck in the back of my mind ever since. As a community we have succeeded in plusing many pluses already. There will always be others on the horizon and we have several staring us in the face, infrastructure (always), a modern fire house, a professional police building and a new YMCA. These are all pluses that need to be addressed. As a taxpayer I would like our city government and community to address a plan to accomplish all of the above.

I learned to swim at the Y many years ago and have been a continual member for approximately 65 years. After taking all the swim classes to learn to swim, I went on to become a Life Guard and a Water Safety Instructor. I took scuba-diving classes at the Y and eventually helped organize a dive team for the Washington County Rescue Squad. Because of the skills I learned, I was able to make two body recoveries while working with the rescue squad. The point is that none of this would have occurred for me or our community without our YMCA. How many lives have been affected over the years because of the positive influence of our YMCA? I believe it is time for the Washington community to again step up and Plus our Pluses and reinvest in our town?s future as our forefathers had the foresight to do for us.

Sincerely

Yale H. Jarvis