I just returned from a work trip to Greensburg, Kansas. In case you don’t know its story, Greensburg is the community in southwestern Kansas that a tornado tried to destroy on May 4, 2007. But the people there are proving nature’s strongest efforts to be weak in the face of their greater efforts to rebuild and to do it right.
This was my second visit to Greensburg on an assignment to write about geothermal installations in this community that has collectively decided to rebuild as green and as sustainably as possible. They already had sustainable energy within the people before the storm - now they're building homes, a school, a hospital, and businesses with it.
Wind, solar, geothermal – reclaimed, recycled, reinvented materials, ICFs, roofing made from recycled aluminum beverage cans, energy-star appliances, low E windows, foam insulation - you name the green technology or eco-friendly building system and Greensburg is using it in creative ways.
But, I learned much more than just facts and hard data for my stories. I saw a community that really gets it. They lost every thing – but they saved what matters most – family, friends, and community. In the rebuilding process, they are becoming a model not only for sustainable building – but the sustainability of the people in the community as well.
Things don’t matter so much when you see that in nature’s madness and fury no thing matters. Every material thing becomes rubble, debris, a broken shard of glass, a splinter of lumber – all heaped and piled in mountains of unrecognizable memories of interrupted lives.
The town’s population has dwindled from approximately 1400 before the tornado to almost 900 now. Yes, some people chose to leave for many good and valid reasons.
Those who stayed are committed to the future. For example, Steve Hewitt, city manager, and Darin Headrick, superintendent of schools, say almost in unison, “We never lose our concept of doing all this for the future for the right reason – it’s all about the kids.” The community is working to design and build structures to last 100 years – that’s dedication to building for the future.
Greensburg celebrates each new home that is built and the families living in them. Some days they take giant strides forward; others only tiny wobbly baby steps – and even some steps backwards or sideways in their ongoing choreography to rebuild lives, homes and businesses.
For many people, nature’s wrath has turned into a gift: the opportunity to be good stewards of their resources and to be a model for other communities not only in rebuilding with brick and mortar but with sharing and caring for each other.
The people of Greensburg learned a simple truism about life on May 4, 2007: today is all that each of us has.
Greensburg is living forward by appreciating today – a community that gets it!
