In a small town, help’s coming. It just might take a while.

More than a month after a huge storm hit my hometown, debris lined the roadway to my mom’s house.

In particular, one huge pile of tree limbs and branches sat at the entrance to her subdivision for more than three weeks. Some people in the neighborhood felt the pile had been dumped there by outsiders.

Others thought it was a neighbor’s storm debris left for crews to clean up. Still others thought it was a homeowner taking advantage of the storm to get rid of yard waste.

Regardless of where it came from or who it belonged to, it sat there for more than a month, a constant reminder of the late summer storm.

Many areas of Woodford County, especially Versailles, waited for days or weeks for debris to be cleared.

And many Versailles residents grumbled online and in grocery stores that the cleanup was taking far too long.

My perspective was a bit different.

Last year, my family and I lived in Anderson, S.C. when Hurricane Irma came through. I awoke, in her wake, to a tree down in our backyard, narrowly having missed power lines and our house.

Within days, our neighborhood was filled with the sound of chainsaws. Everyone took to their backyards to clear downed limbs and burn them. Where we lived, no one was coming by to pick up debris.

Before that, when we lived in Cincinnati, storms often meant the Little Miami River flooded into our basement. When that happened, we knew it was up to us to figure out what to do with the remnants of the storms.

Some in Versailles complained about how long it took to get rid of all of the storm damage. For them, the fact that it would take more than a couple of days to clean up after the storm was just unfathomable.

Versailles Public Works Director Bart Miller said downed trees and limbs that threatened human safety were cleared away within 36 hours.

In the days that followed, cleaning up after the storm meant “all hands on deck,” he said. But, in some cases, he said, yard waste created by the storm didn’t even make it out to the curb for days after the storm, leaving crews to return to places they’d already cleaned up.

In the city, cleanup was done within a couple of weeks, while crews from the county continued to work for weeks later, he said. Equipment from other counties had to be brought in. Private contractors were hired to help out. Volunteers worked to clean up some residents’ yards and businesses.

Versailles Mayor Brian Traugott said the city was fortunate to have a rainy-day fund to pay for the cleanup, because taking care of that debris was a necessity, not a luxury.

“First, it was a safety issue. With school starting, we had to clean up the roadways to ensure line of sight for buses and cars, and to ensure the safety of kids at bus stops and crossing streets,” Traugott said. “And second … I know that some of our senior citizens can’t take their yard waste to the recycling center ... It’s part of living in a small town. You know the people who live here and you know you need to help.”

That’s something that you don’t find in bigger cities. In most larger communities, where you don’t know your neighbor and you don’t know your elected officials, you are on your own.

But not in small towns.

The fact of the matter is small towns have limited personnel, limited budgets and limited hours in a day to service the needs of their residents. Resources in small communities are stretched as far as they can be.

But unlike larger cities, in smaller communities like Versailles and Woodford County, when there’s a disaster, there is help coming.

It may not be in a week. It may not be in two weeks. But help is on its way.

This story was originally published September 25, 2018 at 7:38 PM.