I'm back from a few days off. And the WSAU news blog returns, too.
-Chris

NEWS BLOG (WSAU) What are the things that give a community its identity? For most, it’s their schools. Villages and smaller communities lose something if their kids go to class somewhere else. Communities that don’t have their own schools really don’t have an identity at all if they don’t have their own postal address.

For many years I worked near the Village of Sleepy Hollow in New York. Here was a village that had everything going for it… it was forever immortalized in Washington Irving’s ‘The Legend Of Ichabod Crane’. It was had spectacular views of the Hudson River. Its history dated back to the Colonial period. But modern day Sleepy Hollow doesn’t have its own schools, and doesn’t have a post office. People who lived there thought it was important that they have their own zip code and mailing address. Without it their community was in danger of slipping away… or becoming just a neighborhood within Tarrytown, New York, which itself was being dwarfed by nearby Yonkers and White Plains.

Kronenwetter is in a similar situation. It’s a growing village. They have their own village hall, their own police department, and next month the U.S. Postal Service will recognize “Kronenwetter 54455” as an address.

To outsiders it may seem like small issue. To people who live in Kronenwetter, it’s an important step in establishing their own identity.

Chris Conley
Operations Manager, Midwest Communications-Wausau
3.30.10