DICKSON, Tenn. (WTVF) — Dickson, Tennessee is a place teeming with small town charm and has no shortage of hard working people.
With a population of around 57,000, Dickson is home to folks who have immense pride for their community and each other.
"You feel that community you feel like you know other people's children's names You go to rec league sports and know everybody," Dickson native Amanda Haneline said.
They also face the classic challenges that come with living in a smaller community.
"It's really it's really hard to keep a secret," recent high school graduate Hayden Patrick explained. "Once people figure out about something everybody knows."
We took the 45 minute drive to downtown Dickson where we met Haneline, Patrick, and a few folks working in real estate in the region.
Most of them are Dickson natives who were eager to brag about the charm of living in a quaint area of middle Tennessee.
Real estate agents Sandy Covington and Janna Kinnard acknowledged that the area is growing, which inevitably comes with more traffic, but another issue they raised focused on education.
Everyone we interviewed for this story had similar concerns regarding school staffing and infrastructure.
"We have a teacher shortage and they should pay those people a million dollars a year," Haneline said.
"[The education system] does good in some aspects and in other aspects it needs a lot of improvement," Patrick said.
Dickson County is home to eight elementary schools, four middle schools, and two high schools -- along with two additional learning academies.
They serve 75-hundred students, and employ 13-hundred teachers, bus drivers, and other staff members.
Several of the folks we talked with say they're concerned not only about the need for more teachers -- but the need for better buildings, telling us many of the schools themselves are old, and need serious repairs.
"I feel like I think we really need to look at investing money and improving the actual structure," Kristen Patrick, Hayden's mom said, "Ceiling tiles would fall during class or they would have buckets sitting around to catch water when it rains."
Haneline is a Dickson native who moved away for medical school.
She returned to open a practice and settle here with her husband, a Dickson police officer, to raise their four children.
Given the concerns about the public school district, she said they've been forced to make hard, and expensive, choices about their kids' futures.
"My plan was for them to all be DCHS graduates. We were all gonna be Cougars," she said. "We actually just moved our kids though to a private school last year."
And with the state's new school voucher program, moves like that one can bring relief for some families.
We dug into the city's budget, and found leaders have funded the addition of two more school resource officers, but any money for building improvements is up to the school district itself and, eventually, the county commission.
Despite those challenges, Patrick, who plans to attend Tennessee Tech, said it won't deter him from returning home after college.
"At the end of the day, I'm most likely going to come back here because it's just a great place to live," Patrick said.
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I love a good "before and after" and Nick Beres comes through showing what some TLC can do for some pups found in deplorable conditions. It's so good to see these dogs on their way to a much better future. Enjoy this update!
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