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In the expected words of many a graduation speaker this spring, “You made it.”

Once again, we are on the verge of completing another trip around our sun with just one more day until we hit 2023.

It wasn’t easy. Often society stumbled, but we kept going with the hope that next year will be better.

That’s why this final Community Salute goes out to all of you in our reading area. Life isn’t easy and in a lot of ways maybe it’s not meant to be easy, but each year it is easy to say, Austin and our surrounding area has it better than most.

It’s the people that make it that way. We love our readers and we love that you continue to pick up our paper or head to our website each day. It’s never lost on us that we are built on the backs of this community so with that in mind, thank you.

2023 will have its challenges. It will require us to focus to get past hurdles. Every year comes with that reality, but what we know is whatever challenges lay before us, those of you in Mower, Dodge, Steele and beyond will find ways to step up to meet those challenges.

We live in a good place and it’s worth working for in order to keep our little corner of the world rolling forward. We look forward to being the ones making sure others hear what you are doing.

So here’s to an exciting and meaningful 2023. Now let’s go to work.