Leslie County Promise Zone Community Forum

 Challenges:

  • Getting people back to work (worse in leslie county, but still a regional issue)
  • Terrible drug problem (meth and prescription)
  • Retention of youth and population in general
  • Sustainability of business
  • Sustainability of school
  • Housing and hotels (affordable)
  • Outflow of money
  • Flood insurance

  Assets:

  • Hospital
  • Educational system –
  • Dare
  • Renaissance program
  • Vocational school
  • Music school
  • Caring community
  • Outdoors (park, go kart track, etc)
  • HCR – Hyden
  • Frontier nursing
  • Available workforce (mining, transportation, suppliers)
  • Fiber optics
  • Youth
  • Local bank
  • 4h
  • Cooperative extension
  • Libraries
  • Volunteers (big creek mission, Appalachian service)
  • ATV and RV park
  • Churches
  • Ministerial associations
  • Sheriffs camp
  • Nursing home
  • Future veterans cemetery
  • Volunteer fire dept
  • Miners memorials
  • People want to stay – but they want to work

Known For:

  • Best place to come for hunting and fishing (spend money on vacation – game reserve)
  • Safe
  • Great place to live
  • Manufacturing and technology
  • Retirement homes
  • Tourism
  • Recreational facilities
  • Coals impact is huge with no replacement
  • Not diversified enough
  • Lack of land/land ownership issues
  • Continued momentum
  • Roads
  • Proximity to hazard
  • Technology call center (they have the equipment, building, training)
  • Development of adventure tourism
  • Housing
  • Retraining
  • Food co-op
  • Tax credit lending
  • Single, duplex, apartment – high quality – alternative to HUD/Section 8

Why haven’t you gotten there yet:

Ideas:

  • Technology call center (they have the equipment, building, training)
  • Development of adventure tourism
  • Housing
  • Retraining
  • Food co-op
  • Tax credit lending
  • Single, duplex, apartment – high quality – alternative to HUD/Section 8