Harlowton, MT

During Holiday vacation, the elementary students at Hillcrest are working on Paying it Forward projects around the community.  They are on the look out for things they can do to help out in their community!  Maybe shovel snow before sledding, or visiting a neighbor or someone in the nursing home.  It will be exciting to see all that they accomplished when break is over and they turn in their Mo-mentum cards.  Lets all keep the Mo-mentum going in Harlowton.

When a local book club read the book Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin, the members took Dr. Mortenson’s message to heart. The book club decided they could best spread the message of bringing peace to the world through education — one school at a time by starting at home. When Harlowton High School’s English teacher said she would like to teach the book to her seniors but didn’t have funds in her budget to purchase the novel, the club bought the books for the class. Upon completion of their study in January, the book club will present them with a note explaining why the books were purchased for them and asking them to “pay it forward.”

After gathering input from the community surveys and meetings and several revisions, we have completed a Vision Statement for Harlowton. 

Vision Statement:

Harlowton is a community with a common vision and ideals.  It is a vibrant, nurturing town that appeals to people of all ages, races, colors and creeds.  We encourage civil discussion and participation by our citizens, and we mentor our young and old. 

We are dedicated to investing in first-rate education and understand that education is life-long, so we offer wide-ranging academic and vocational learning opportunities.  In equal measure, we support a healthy lifestyle for all of our citizens  and, to this end,  provide excellent health care and health care facilities.   

We are committed to building and maintaining a successful, entrepreneurial economy with a small-town atmosphere where young people have opportunity and seniors can find security in retirement.  We support this economy by shopping with our local merchants whenever we can. 

We recognize and value our responsibility and connection to each other and our history, natural resources and environment, and we are committed to improving Harlowton’s quality of life by investing in our infrastructure and providing our citizens with recreational opportunities.

The Horizons Steering Committee distributed surveys thru the fall to collect input to write the community vision statement.  The results from the survey have been compiled and are now available.

Community Survey Results

Harlowton is pleased to have recruited a new V.I.S.T.A, which is a Volunteer In Service To America. A V.I.S.T.A’s responsibility is to aide in areas that are needed around a community. The program is funded by Horizon’s Montana Community Foundation, Harlowton High School, Wheatland Memorial Hospital, and Wheatland County. The new V.I.S.T.A will be working in the field of wellness and health.

Lea comes to us from California where she graduated from the University of California at Santa Barbra. She is very excited to work with all the people in this community, she is here to listen and get involved, to be a service to the people. Lea wants to make connections and reach out to everyone to activate the ideas and goals that people see happening in the community. Her main goal is to uncover the gifts that she knows every person has. Lea is ready to get involved and meet the members of this community.

This community never seems to slow down.  We just keep getting things done, and that impresses me.  The group who attended leadership plenty in the spring decided that rather than decide on one project together as a group, we should each give a little extra in our home, yards, where we work and around the other places that are important to us. 

 We are going to beautify Harlowton one good deed at a time and then, pay it forward.  The idea was so exciting, we could continue working on the projects we were passionate about and make those stronger and better.  The project is designed so that we all have something meaningful to contribute to make our community a better, more beautiful place to live.

If you have a story of Harlowton’s MoMentum, wheather it was your own deed or one you saw someone else doing, Post it here!