By Karen Price
On a Friday night in late January, members of the Etna community gathered at a local brewpub to share their stories of what brought them to town and why.
Some were lifelong residents of the borough located just outside Pittsburgh. Some had moved away only to return in their later years. Others saw great things happening in the town in recent years and decided to make it their new home. What they all had in common was a love for Etna, and their stories will now help inform the work of the Etna Heart & Soul team.
“It was a really wonderful evening,” said Megan Tuñón, one of the members of the Etna Heart & Soul core team responsible for bringing the PA Humanities-sponsored initiative to the borough. “We heard from long time and new residents who all had a unique story to tell about why they love our community.”
This year, PA Humanities is celebrating 10 years of partnering with Community Heart & Soul to bring this innovative model for community development and engagement to the state. Founded in Vermont, Heart & Soul is a resident-driven process to engage all members of a community and learn what they love about their town and what they hope for its future, and plan for how to achieve it together. Etna began the multi-year process in early 2024 and is one of 16 communities that are either in the midst of or who have completed Heart & Soul with the support of PA Humanities.
Heart & Soul teams spend months in the community gathering stories, with the goal of reaching representatives from all demographic categories. The event at CoStar Brewing in downtown Etna was this team’s first open-mic style public story gathering event.
One woman told a story about growing up in Etna, moving away, then coming back as a single empty nester. Her walks along the nature trail brought comfort as she coped with the deaths of loved ones. She also met a woman who invited her to the local garden club meeting, where she was introduced not only to a woman she once babysat decades earlier but also a woman who remembered her grandparents’ market and the bologna sandwiches they used to make. Their shared history was comforting, and she also talked of how the community rallies together in times of trouble, such as raising funds after a neighbor’s house burned down.
One gentleman said he moved there from a more suburban town, where people didn’t do nice things for one another. He was surprised when he found that a neighbor had pulled his cans in for him on trash day, and other small acts of kindness that continued to occur. People in Etna just tend to give, he said, and he hadn’t experienced that in other communities.
Another storyteller moved to the area in 2019. Her work brought her to town frequently and she attended council meetings and saw the work being done with the Etna EcoDistrict and how people showed up for their community. She wanted her children to grow up around people who care, she said.
Once a Heart & Soul team is finished collecting data, they use it to come up with the themes that are important to the community. Those themes then inform value statements and, ultimately, an action plan for the future.
But one of the immediate and ongoing benefits throughout the process is the opportunity to get to know one another.
“(The event) was a really lovely way to connect with one another and strengthen our bonds as neighbors,” Tuñón said.
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