Letter to the Editor: The power of the quotient

I want to speak to one word and three numbers. The three numbers are 50, 100, and 200. Think about them briefly. Select your favorite and we will get back to them shortly.

The one word is Community. What we have all realized in the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, which really is the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts and Community, is truly unique and a testament to the collective action and participation of so many in our community.

My wife, Kathie, and I knew we would be supporters, but we pledged our support later in the first campaign. We wanted to see the Dr. Phillips Center would be defined, not just as a structure, but for the vitality of what it would contain to ensure the support and involvement of our community. Like others, it mattered more important to us what would be inside that would allow both the Center and community to thrive, not merely what the Center might look like from the outside.

Two years on, the vision of those guiding this effort is gaining incredible clarity. But, the most remarkable moment, the moment that stunned, that caused an audible murmur, was that every eighth grade student in our community participated at the Center this past year. Has that ever occurred anywhere else? Could there be a clearer sign this remarkable Center is, only two years into its brief arrival, already having a lasting impression on our community than the wholesale participation of our youth…those that will follow in our footsteps in their appreciation of, and devotion to, a vibrant future for our Center? I believe the audible murmur is our affirmative answer and paints what we must do.

Back to the numbers I gave you earlier. We have a goal before us. To each, it is a big number — $10 million, some might say daunting. But, there is strength in the simple things we have all, since likely the beginning of time, been taught and, in turn, taught our children — one step at a time. And, that is the power of the quotient.

The numbers I gave you earlier break our goal down to one step at a time. All we need is 200 donors to each provide $50,000 in funding, 100 to each provide $100,000, or 50 to each provide $200,000. Viewed this way, it is very doable for each of us together.

We all have the opportunity to ensure the numerator of this important quotient — the remarkable events that occur here every day — have both the structure and support they need to thrive and continue the great work of community we have all rejoiced in the last two years. All that is required is that we each, with the benefit of hindsight at the remarkable things already accomplished, and confident in the greatness of its future, take our place as the fundamental denominator that will make this great work move still further ahead and thrive for many, many years, and thousands and thousands of our community’s youth. I trust you will join us. This can be done quickly and it can be done emphatically. We can all have our cake and eat it too. And, we can all add still another exclamation point to the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts!!

—Bill Hohns