By Mayor Kendy Alvarez, Lewisburg Borough
Lewisburg often appears to be the quintessential rural small town—especially as winter approaches and downtown glows under holiday lights. Our annual tree lighting ceremony, late-night shopping, and holiday movie screenings draw residents and visitors into a storybook version of small-town life. On the surface, it gives off a Hallmark holiday movie vibe. And in many ways, it truly is that warm and welcoming.
But anyone who has served in local government knows that even the most picturesque communities require constant care. Beneath the surface, rising tensions on a range of issues can boil over at any moment.
In my first term as mayor, Lewisburg has faced quite a few emergencies and emotionally charged moments. We have responded to an active shooter, a college student’s fatal drug overdose, severe storms that displaced multiple families, several fires, and a tragic pedestrian death. During each of these moments, I relied heavily on personal relationships—with our police chief, university administrators, nonprofit leaders, journalists, clergy, and social-service partners—to ensure communication was clear and coordinated. Those relationships were not just helpful; they were essential.
Across the Commonwealth, municipal leaders are experiencing similar patterns. Challenges often begin quietly: conflicting views on school matters, misinformation circulating online, fear-driven rumors, neighborhood disputes, or anxiety about development and demographic change. These signals rarely originate in council chambers. They surface first in classrooms, church basements, waiting rooms, social-service agencies, and downtown storefronts. By the time the issue rises to the level of local government or law enforcement, it has already grown more entrenched and more emotional.
Search for Common Ground has proposed a simple but transformative idea for municipalities navigating this reality: build trust and relationships before crisis emerges. Their “Trusted Leaders Coalition” model brings together people who may not always agree—who may come from different political, cultural, or socioeconomic backgrounds—but who are deeply trusted within their own networks. The coalition meets regularly, shares what they are seeing, builds understanding across lines of difference, and coordinates an early response that prevents conflict from escalating.
Why Lewisburg? Why Now?
Lewisburg sits at the intersection of multiple identities. We are a rural community with deep agricultural roots. We are a college town shaped by Bucknell University’s presence. We are a historic downtown enlivened by artists, entrepreneurs, families, and visitors. And we are a borough experiencing the same pressures facing many Pennsylvania municipalities: economic transition, an aging population, youth mental-health needs, public safety concerns, social change, and increasing polarization.
Crucially, these challenges are emerging at a time when public trust in government is at historic lows. More and more, residents do not trust that government is acting in their best interest. Many no longer have faith in elected officials. Some hesitate to accept help because they fear it comes with strings attached or hidden motives. This erosion of trust makes governing more complicated and destabilizing; traditional tools—public statements, informational meetings, policy explanations—do not carry the same credibility they once did.
That is precisely why relationship-based approaches matter. Trust today is built through people, not institutions. When residents hear from someone they already know—a pastor, a teacher, a business owner, a nonprofit leader, or a neighbor—they are far more likely to listen, ask questions, and feel reassured. A Trusted Leaders Coalition embraces this reality and uses it to rebuild confidence in our civic life from the ground up.
And here in Lewisburg, we have something many communities struggle to build: informal networks of trust that quietly maintain stability. Nonprofit directors call clergy when a family is in crisis. School counselors collaborate with social-service organizations. Business owners share what they hear from customers. University administrators alert borough officials to emerging concerns. Journalists check in when they sense a story gaining emotional traction. These relationships often activate long before a problem becomes public—and they make an enormous difference.
Yet informality has its limits. It relies on personal familiarity that can vanish with leadership turnover. It may unintentionally exclude voices not already connected. And without structure, it offers no formal mechanism for early-warning conversations or coordinated public communication.
Formalizing these existing networks into a Trusted Leaders Coalition would strengthen and stabilize them. It would preserve institutional memory, deepen representation, and ensure that Lewisburg has a proactive system—not just an ad-hoc one—to intervene early, with clarity and trust, when tensions begin to rise.
Imagining Lewisburg’s Trusted Leaders Coalition
When I imagine such a coalition, I picture the very people I already reach out to in uncertain moments.
Conflict-resolution experts like Susan Jordan of Susquehanna Valley Mediation and Tracy Strosser of Transitions would anchor the coalition with trauma-informed practices and skilled facilitation. Community health and social-service leaders—Mark Stankiewicz, Cynthia Peltier, Sue Auman, Rachel Herman, and Kim Wheeler—see the daily pressures of housing, childcare, food insecurity, mental-health needs, and regional economic shifts. Education and youth voices—Lynn Pierson, Moe McGuiness, and Gibson O’Mealy—help us understand the earliest signs of polarization, which often appear in youth spaces and on social media long before adults recognize them. Faith leaders like Rev. Tim Hogan add moral grounding and pastoral insight. Public safety, including Chief Dan Embeck, and my own role as mayor ensure that crisis response and communication remain coordinated and transparent. Business and economic leaders—Chad North and Lynne Ragusea—offer a real-time sense of resident sentiment and local economic health. Healthcare leadership from Dr. Jack Devine illuminates emotional and physical stressors that impact families and communities. And finally, local journalism—represented here by Bill Bowman of The Daily Item—helps interpret how narratives form and how they can be corrected or clarified before misinformation takes hold.
Together, these leaders see the full picture of community wellbeing.
How a Coalition Like This Would Strengthen Lewisburg
A Trusted Leaders Coalition would meet consistently, not only in moments of crisis. It would allow leaders to share what they’re observing and collaborate on responses—from calming communication, to dialogue sessions, to quiet interventions that never make the news yet prevent real harm.
Most importantly, it distributes responsibility: no single leader carries the weight of community conflict alone. Residents can feel confident knowing that even when disagreements arise, the people entrusted to guide the community are communicating, cooperating, and committed to listening with respect.
A Model for Municipalities Across Pennsylvania
The framework is simple: build relationships before they are needed, create channels for early warning, and coordinate trusted responses that keep disagreement from becoming division.
In an era marked by declining trust and rising polarization, Lewisburg shows another way forward—one rooted in connection, communication, and shared stewardship.
And if there is one lesson I have learned as mayor, it is this: the strongest time to build the relationships that keep a community safe is before a conflict begins.
Article from the December 2025 Municipal Reporter | Responding to Political Violence Edition
