Benfield to Offer Information on Caldwell Soil & Water Projects

June 27, 2007

HUDSON—Dennis A. Benfield of Hudson, elected last year as a Caldwell Soil & Water Conservation District (SWCD) supervisor, is starting a personal publicity campaign to make Caldwell County citizens aware of some of the district’s projects.

“The only promises I made in the campaign were that I would work hard to be a good supervisor on the soil and water board, and that I would try to help keep people aware of the kinds of projects the district is sponsoring in Caldwell County,” Benfield said.

“It’s been about six months since I joined some very dedicated people on the board,” he added. “I’ve learned an awful lot and I have so much more to learn, but I have begun to see how this board uses its funds as ‘seed money’ to cause some very important conservation efforts.”

Benfield said the most frequent comment he heard in his 2006 campaign was that people had never heard of the Soil & Water Conservation District before, or had heard of it, but had no idea what the board does.

“I promised to keep them informed. I focused as much as I could on learning the job for the first several months, then in May, I started trying to inform the public about what we do.”

In the last six weeks, Benfield, with the board’s approval, has tipped off the news media about projects being sponsored by the Caldwell SWCD, or sent them news releases with photos, and started speaking at interested civic clubs.

In the last two weeks, the new SWCD supervisor has revamped his old campaign website from 2006—“dennisbenfield.com”—to include a number of SWCD news stories, links to several related SWCD sites and a special SWCD “photo gallery.”

Benfield said he plans an automated telephone call to at least 10,000 Caldwell County households to advice recipients to look for SWCD news on the county website—“caldwell.co.nc.us—or at his personal website which also offers a “contact me” page.

Anyone interested in contacting supervisor Benfield about the Caldwell SWCD, especially how it might help with a specific land improvement project, can email him at dennis@dennisbenfield.com or call at 828-396-5453.