People making a difference

It’s said that good things come to those who wait. That may be, but even better things come to those who persevere. That’s certainly the case with two recent success stories in our area, the recently opened Crane Lake Visitors Center and the Community Hub in Ely, which opened late last summer.
It’s worth noting that the opening of the new visitors center at Voyageurs National Park comes as the park is celebrating its 50th anniversary. Crane Lake serves as the eastern gateway to the park and a visitors center there was supposed to be part of the deal when the park was created back in 1975. Visitors centers were opened at Rainy Lake, Lake Kabetogama, and Ash River, but Crane Lake’s center proved an unmet promise, at least until this month.
While the National Park Service played a role through its 20-year lease of the facility, it was the community of Crane Lake that was instrumental in making it happen through years of sustained effort. The result is a welcoming new center and full-service campground that, combined, are going to bring a big economic benefit to the area.
The township-led effort tapped funds from the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund, totaling $6.75 million over three appropriations. The Voyageurs Conservancy is funding exhibits, while Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation played a role as well. There were many moving parts and hurdles along the way, but each time, folks in Crane Lake met the challenge and will now reap the benefits of their hard work.
While the creation of the Community Hub in Ely involved different people and a somewhat different journey, the story was the same: residents of a community coming together to realize a dream.
It would have been easy to have given up along the way. The Ely Area Community Foundation, the group behind what is now dubbed simply “The Hub,” had worked on multiple iterations of the concept in different locations and with different partners, and each seemed to hit a roadblock somewhere along the line. But the folks behind The Hub weren’t about to give up that easily. When the former state Revenue Building became available, the group behind the project saw a way forward and jumped at the opportunity. Major donations from the public, combined with funding from USDA’s Rural Development and the United Way of Northeastern Minnesota and with help from the city of Ely, the group adjusted its goals, drew in new partners and made a successful project that is providing critically-needed child care, a gym and wellness center, and headquarters for at least two nonprofits.
None of these success stories happen as a result of people sitting on the couch or wasting time spelunking through rabbit holes on social media. They are the result of the hard work of community development, which is how we make life better in the places where we live.
Both the Crane Lake Visitors Center and The Hub represent great examples of this kind of publicly spirited effort that truly makes a difference.