You are infrastructure.

I’ve had this image on my mind quite a bit lately.

The day this happened was chilly for early September. It was September 4, 2019, exactly, and we were so excited to be pulling this mural tarp off the front of what was going to be the new courtyard. We placed the mural there as a way to bring hope to our community—a way to hide the ugly, collapsing interior of what was supposed to be a theatre.

With a lack of funds, and an organization being pulled in too many directions, we decided the best we could do was create an outdoor venue. There was so much energy and excitement in that moment. Bailey Richards and I stood across the street for hours, it seems, talking about possibilities and what the future could hold.

In that exact moment, I didn’t know that I would resign from the Board of Directors of the Appalachian Arts Alliance and throw my hat in the ring for the Executive Director position. I knew I didn’t have the education or experience that was expected. The board knew it too. But I had heart. I had passion. I had a deep love for my community. I had work ethic, and a desire to see something our community wanted and needed come to life.

To many, it was the last resort.

After a grueling interview process (designed intentionally to ensure equity, fairness, and unquestionable integrity), I was hired and began my work as Executive Director on November 25, 2019.

What stands out to me now is astonishment.

Because I did not think I would be here long. I made sure I left my former employer in the best standing, as I was afraid I’d have to go back before long. If you had told me then what the next six and a half years would look like, I would have laughed like a hyena.

And yet here we are.

Over 12,000 people impacted each year for the past two years and growing.

Programming that once required hours of travel is now here in our community. Not reduced or watered down, but real. Professional artists and musicians teaching and sharing their craft. Tiny ballerinas learning their first positions. Young actors learning stage direction and technique. Visual artists gaining access to materials, instruction, and the confidence to use them.

The ArtStation has become more than a space. It has become a place of civic infrastructure.

It hosts baby showers, weddings, memorial services, school functions, dances, fundraisers, meetings, conferences, and community gatherings of every kind.

It becomes a shelter during fires and flooding.

It becomes a place where people are held when systems fail.

We exhibit art here.
We break bread here.
We dance here.
We sing here.
We celebrate here.
We create here.

But most importantly, we build community here.

And as that community has been built inside these walls, it has spread outward.

Hazard has grown in visible and tangible ways since that photograph was taken. New and vibrant public art now lives on buildings throughout town. More than 80 businesses have opened. New opportunities for commerce and tourism have emerged. Energy that once felt distant now feels present.

And it appears we are not done yet.

I think that is why I am in this moment, sharing these thoughts about this whole adventure.

Because we are not done yet.

One of the best parts about the Appalachian Arts Alliance is the ever-evolving work that is always being done. Developing classes and programs. Creating productions. Shifting space. Making space. Enrolling, collecting, creating, building, and then doing it again. 

And now, as we have expanded our operations to Bobby Davis Park, the sky is the limit with what we can offer in Visual Arts. Having this location also elevated other organizational possibilities, but one thing is for sure. When we move into a place, we bring it back to life. Our presence and its improvements are already noticeably visible. The park is full of life, more color every day, and laughter echoes off the nearly 80-year-old walls.

But what is it that hasn’t “hit” about all of this?

About the immense growth that has occurred. The lives being changed. The confidence is being built. The life skills being shared. The self-worth and value being elevated daily.

What about this work is not enough to gain the support and investment needed to ensure its longevity?

I recently gave opening remarks at the America’s Rural Future event, held here in Hazard, where I said:

“The future of rural America will not be built solely through extractive economies or outside rescue narratives.

It will be built through investment in people, relationships, creativity, education, entrepreneurship, and local leadership.

That is the common thread connecting this work. A growing understanding that real transformation is place-based. That systems change requires collaboration. That economic mobility is tied to educational opportunity, cultural vitality, mental wellness, and civic belonging. And increasingly, there is recognition of something many rural communities have always known:

Creativity is infrastructure.

Not decoration. Infrastructure.

And infrastructure only matters if it can endure.

Too often, rural communities receive short bursts of attention, temporary programs, or one-time investments that disappear before real transformation can take root. What communities like Hazard need are sustainable investments. Investments willing to stay long enough for trust to grow, for young people to develop, for downtowns to recover, and for local ecosystems to strengthen themselves over time. The economic decline did not happen in a three year period, so why do we think it can be fixed in a three year grant cycle?

Real rural revitalization cannot operate on emergency-room thinking. It requires patient capital. Long-term partnership. Continued belief in the people already doing the work on the ground. And that sustainability is not only financial. It is cultural sustainability. Civic sustainability. Human sustainability.

Because when you invest consistently in creativity, education, public spaces, and local leadership, communities begin building futures that can sustain themselves generation after generation.”

This is not theory.

This is lived experience.

And it leads to a simple truth:

Rural communities are not waiting to be transformed. They are already transforming while being asked to prove that transformation is happening.

Here in Eastern Kentucky, resources have been extracted for generations. Coal severance funds helped build arenas, stadiums, and attractions elsewhere built on the labor of coal miners from right here in this region while communities like ours continue to fight for the same chance to ensure the next generation has something better than what came before. And doing so in combat to the constant draining of our young people, and the constant push towards acceptance that these larger cities and places that our resources built, are better than remaining at home in the mountains. And still, our people continue to carry what they must. Food on the table. Gas in the car. Clothes on their backs. There is no excess capacity in the system to also carry the full weight of institutional rebuilding alone.

We cannot do this in isolation.

And yet too often, the investment that does trickle in is short-term, conditional, or buried in layers of paperwork that assume capacity already exists to absorb it without strain. We do not need more barriers disguised as accountability. We do not need proximity based funding decisions or systems that reward visibility over need. We need trust. We need long-term partners willing to stand beside the work, not above it. We need investment that stays long enough to become structure. Because if you want transformation that lasts, you have to remain long enough for it to take root.

I think about that morning again.

The tarp. The cold air. Bailey and I standing across the street, talking about what might be possible. At the time, we thought we were imagining a future. But we were not imagining it. We were already inside it. It just hadn’t been recognized yet. And that is still true. We are not behind. We are unrecognized. We are still building. And we deserve it. 

The only question left is whether you will recognize it in time to be a part of it.