Rebuilding a center for the community but could it be bigger?

The Clingman community is shaping up well with the groundbreaking of a replacement to the Community Center that was lost to fire two years ago, but with a thought to the growing tourism potential of the area they could have built bigger.

For any small rural area a community center is important to providing meeting facilities for the many church, school and charitable activities that can be the lifeblood and entertainment of its people.

Hugh Chatham Hospital has played an important roll in staffing and updating the medical center, as has the Ronda Volunteer fire department with building a new substation in Clingman.

The East Wilkes area is an important potential growth zone with its access to 421 and proximity to Wilkesboro, Elkin and Union Grove. For those who live in Clingman these larger towns play an important roll, but a sense of independence is important to the people who have long lived there.

With that independence comes a need for community centers and updated technology and infrastructure, something that Ronda's mayor and commissioners are working hard to achieve in the coming years.

Last month's town hall meeting voted to start upgrading the Ronda town hall that serves both communities of Ronda and Clingman who were joined in countywide mergers.

Recycling, Internet and water infrastructure have also been addressed and agreed upon as important issues to revitalizing the community.

With so many dedicated and talented citizens it seems like the Clingman and Ronda community will achieve some of the hidden potential seen by many when focusing on the growing tourism and wine industry that East Wilkes and West Yadkin are starting to take part in.

It will be interesting to see if at some point this new community center could also take on some of the dual rolls that Jonesville's new Town Hall and Government Center have undertaken. Clingman's new Community Center stands almost as close to a Highway 421 exit as Jonesville's center is to the Interstate 77 exit.

One only has to ask, will the new 6,000 square foot building be big enough for what Clingman and East Wilkes might need down the line?