Voice of Voters- Palmyra and Edinburg

It was veteran appreciation week last Friday night at Southeast High School for the big football game. Parents and students teemed with excitement as they lined the stadium under the floodlights, and local paramedics honked their ambulance horns for the kids as they bounced around the field. Friday night lights are a spectacle for the Southeast community, as families from the neighboring townships come together to enjoy one of America’s favorite pastimes.

Residents of Palmyra and Edinburg express their hopes and concerns for the future of their townships ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, with a large focus on Southeast Schools as a focal point for their community. 

For the past 20 years, the Southeast community of parents and faculty have been trying to raise funds to update their track field, which has not been replaced since the 1970s. 

Kelly Simmons is a 2nd grade teacher at Southeast and has lived in Edinburg for the past six years. Simmons said she knows a number of people from the community that are interested in the track project, and she hopes she and her kids will be able to use it soon.

Local Palmyra resident and owner of 62 Excavating Ian Shaw said the school is in need of an updated track, as the track & field team does not have the resources to host home meets. The new track would also be a safe space for residents of all ages to walk around, as the roads in the surrounding area do not have sidewalks and are prone to fast-moving traffic. 

“We don’t want to put anything on a levee”, Shaw said, “because people like to vote no on levees … they don’t want to pay additional taxes to a school district, because their kids are not there anymore. And I can’t say that I blame them. So we try to do it without putting stuff on a ballot and forcing them to do it that way. We just try to get their interests up and tell them that it’s for the community.”

Shaw said he will help excavate the existing track for the new project to help bring costs down. Shaw said his business has stayed afloat following the COVID-19 pandemic, but rising prices for piping, stone, fuel and equipment has resulted in some clients canceling their projects to save money.

“The one thing I love about this community is we try to shop local,” Shaw said. “We don’t have a lot of businesses around here, but we all try to support each other. Look at these end zone signs. These are all businesses from around this community, and they’ve all donated to this school district to help with the track project.”

So far, the Southeast Pirates Athletic Community Endeavor (S.P.A.C.E.) has raised around $375,000 out of the $800,000 needed to update the track. Southeast Schools recently pledged $250,000 to help with the costs.

S.P.A.C.E. volunteer Jen Thames said the group has been posting banners around the community to raise support and funding for the track. The banners display a track field with yellow tape racing around the track to show how much funding the group has raised. 

“We recently had two or three people join our team who specialize in grant writing,” Thames said. And they are going to start looking for grants for us so that we can raise some more funds.”