By Madie Murray

I had the privilege of having one of our wonderful business owners confide in me how very concerned they were about whether or not they would be able to sustain their business through this tough economic time on our Island.   It made me think very hard about what I might be able to do to help besides shop, eat and play more locally myself.

I realized I could tell others in our incredible community how very much they are needed to help our precious population of unique businesses and restaurants survive.   It’s done very simply…we go out of our way to patronize them any time and every time we can.   If we’re going to practice sustainability, we can’t forget our fragile commerce.

We need to have dinner at the restaurants and buy items at businesses we rely on so heavily when we are looking for donation for fundraisers.  How can we expect them to give something to us when they are barely hanging on themselves?  Sometimes we haven’t even purchased anything there lately or ever, yet we’re asking them to give.

Granted.  We are all trying to pinch our pennies, keep our non-profits going and save a nickel wherever we can.  But we can’t forget that our businesses need US to keep them alive.   If we are going to expect them to contribute to our causes, they should be able to expect us to support them, recommend them and patronize them – more now than ever before.

Summer is coming and the tourists and summer vacationers will once again visit our town, our businesses, our marinas, our restaurants and our many wonderful tourist activities, and I hope the town is bursting once again with renewed vigor.  We need to remember, however, that they will go away come September and our businesses have to rely another long winter solely on us who live here.  It’s time to pay it forward.

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