Leadership Williams County Class Leaves Lasting Impact For The Sanctuary

By: Jenna Frisby
THE VILLAGE REPORTER
publisher@thevillagereporter.com

Last September, Leadership Williams County commenced their new class at an overnight retreat at Camp Palmer. Leadership Williams County (LWC) is a class that is offered through the Bryan Chamber of Commerce which takes twelve individuals from the community and teaches them about various local government topics to create better leaders for tomorrow.

The class is spanned out over nine months, starting in September, and ending in May. Each month a new topic is discussed and many times they go to an onsite location to learn hands on about government.

Topics covered are local history, county government, city government, justice and public safety, the business of doing business, education, health and human services, community cultures with diversity and the arts, and leadership of the future.

Leadership Williams County was originally organized back in 1990 when a concern for developing leaders for tomorrow was presented at the Chamber of Commerce.

Since then, the program has had over 250 graduates who have made an impact within the community.

The class is taught each year by Dan Yahraus, Executive Director of the chamber and facilitator of LWC. This was Yahraus’ 13th class that he has taught in the 25 years he’s been involved.

This class members were Pheba Banerjee-Sam, Jim Cavanaugh, Craig Grieser, Brenda Housh, Hal Kenety, Christy Kimpel, John Lehner. Brian Roehrig, Cody Rohrbaugh, Devin Rummel, Joe Schlosser, and Billy Taylor.

On Wednesday, May 15th, 2024 the group of twelve held their final class and as part of looking back at the last nine months they spent together, they gathered where they had spent hard laboring hours working together on their community project, in the basement of The Sanctuary in Bryan.

The group got to see the final result of all their hard work as well as gather and share their reflections on the time they spent together.

The project, one of Yahraus’ and the program’s, requirements for each class to do, consisted of a group project to be done together. In past years, Yahraus has had to help immensely with this.

However, that was not the case this year. In fact, Yahraus recalled that he hardly had to help, that “This class was truly a team and thought outside of the box”, it was “one of the best classes” he had ever had because everyone chose to stay so involved through the entire process.

Standing in the basement of The Sanctuary Yahraus teared up for a moment as he voiced his astonishment of the transformation that had taken place there.

Before the group had decided on their project of fixing up the basement of The Sanctuary, the basement stood wet, unusable in any capacity, with three humidifiers running 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

Now, the space is completely dry with concrete flooring. Flat lighting fixtures that light up the space, and freshly painted and treated walls. The funds for the project were completely raised by the class members through their connections within the community.

In total they raised nearly $5,600. The best part was that only $3,000 of that was spent to fix the space allowing them to put the rest of the funds towards purchasing an industrial washer for The Sanctuary.

The group chose the project of transforming the space into a useable area for The Sanctuary because of what The Sanctuary does for the community.

The Sanctuary, which resides in downtown Bryan, OH, is where impactful transformations for individuals happen. They offer a safe haven to those in need with the tools to build themselves a brighter future.

Individuals who enter The Sanctuary are not just given a bed to sleep in. They are given their own space of privacy, while still embracing community areas where they can learn to build skills with others who may be going through similar situations to them.

The individuals who enter and reside at The Sanctuary are greeted with compassion and care. The Sanctuary makes it their goal to always go beyond just providing a safe space to their guests, but to help them take each of the next steps in rebuilding their lives back to normal.

The goal of The Sanctuary has always been to help their guests become more self-sufficient, getting their lives back in balance, and most importantly helping them have a relationship with Jesus through that process.

Because of all these reasons the LWC group knew they had to help The Sanctuary with their basement. In only a few short months’ time, they have completed something otherwise out of reach.

But because they came together as a group of leaders within the Bryan community, they have made something that was just a dream for The Sanctuary now a reality.

The basement space is now useable. The group also went above and beyond and created a storage system for The Sanctuary guests who may come with more things than they have room for in their personal rooms.

This allows those guests to have storage, as well as for The Sanctuary to have extra storage for donated items they hold in case someone would come to them and not have something that is a necessity.

While the group was gathered for one of the last times together they all shared some favorite things that they had gotten out of the time they had spent together.

From talking about what they had done in that very room to the candid conversations and discussions that were had while with Mayor Carrie Schlade of Bryan, it was evident that each individual recognized that they were more than a group that was formed together but that they were the next Leaders of Williams County.

While each member of the class had a different background, some being born and raised in Bryan and some just having moved here in the last year, each individual displayed how even though they each had important jobs throughout the community, none of them were “too good” to do anything that was asked of them.

All of them worked this project together, using power tools, getting dirty digging dirt and even building from scratch a storage system.

The group would like to take the time to share a special thanks to all of the following businesses and individuals who donated funds to help them with their project. Spangler Candy, Bard Manufacturing Company Inc., Newlyn Quest Club, Anderson Vreeland, Dan Yahraus, Ohio Gas Company, Rotary Club, Civic League, Daavlin, Jim Cavanaugh, Altenloh Brinck & Company, Advanced Rehab Tech, Current Office Solutions, Bryan Chamber of Commerce, Howie Vreeland, John Lehner, Hal Kenety, Handyman Hardware, and the Noecker Family.

The Leaders Williams County program commenced their graduation for this round on Wednesday evening. Celebrating together their well achieved accomplishments not only through their project at The Sanctuary, but also individually in each of them through the knowledge they have gained throughout the class about the community they all reside in and impact with the leadership role they have taken on. This experience has truly helped them all to be the next Leaders of Williams County.