The State of Highlands County and the NCNCHINC

We were founded in October 2009.  I started this organization with the assistance of my three sisters, with the dream of doing community service in our community, not just in Avon Park, Fl., but by the grace of God, throughout the community of underserved people in the United States.  I must admit I borrowed the term underserved from a fine organization in New York City called Services for the Underserved and if we can have a small fraction of the impacted on people in the underserved community as they do, we will have done good for the community of people in need of our services.

 

We are the National Community Network and Coalition of Highlands, INC.  Because of our long name we use the acronym NCNCHINC.  Our headquarters is located in Avon Park, FL., a small city in a rural area, that is growing quickly.  And by the grace of God we own our headquarters location.,  The county it is in was at about 38,000 in population in 2004, now it is well over 100,000 today.  People are moving here for the obvious reasons Florida Sunshine, also it has been discovered that Highlands County is located on prime real estate.  It sits about 11 feet above sea level in Central Florida away from the coastlines and shielded from most hurricanes.  And the real estate is relatively cheap.    

 

We the NCNCHINC is a first of its kind, in Highlands County, FL.  We represent urban solutions in a currently rural area, therefore though we have a need or need has yet to fully materialize.  With the direction and course of Highlands County, which is quickly populating into a full size city, then will come the problems associated with a populous county or city.

 

Do not get me wrong, Highlands County has its share of problems  already needing to be solved.   However, we are not being duly recognized by the political map yet and therefore funding for these problems such as the; disproportionately high rate of AIDS among the black community, the crippling drug epidemic, the lost prevention problems at retail outlets due to drugs, the high unemployment rate and the lack of living wages jobs which is driving businesses away, the illiteracy among young adults  making us unattractive to new light industry investment and sad to say in this small city the political corruption driving this city into a dead-end, due to the lack of Federal oversight.

 

Highlands County once almost totally driven my the agriculture industry is on the borderline of change, as new development is on the horizon.  But sadly if some of these problems are not addressed the citizens here now may well be left out as talent to fill-in the slots of progress will have to be imported for elsewhere.  We at the NCNCHINC do not think this is far and just like the fruit was harvest by the people of Highlands County for many years, it is time to harvest the people in these communities into productive citizens of the State of Florida.

 

We at the NCNCHINC are preparing for this renaissance.  We are a very small organization at this time with a huge dream.  We have a handful of dedicated volunteers to include myself.  And we are in training, as we are slowing organizing.  We are waiting on our 501 c 3 documents to be assigned by the IRS while concurrently working on gaining our occupational license to open our doors the public.  As I am in the process of gaining entrance to a badly needed six months grant writing course, so that we can gain funds to address some of these problems.  Once we open our doors, we will start to solicit more volunteers to do community work and serve the people in need most, the underserved in our community.

 

Frank Paul Jones