Who Is Bear

My Life and qualifications;
           
             

I am the founder and president of the Hutto Citizens Group since its inception in August of 2006 which has been instrumental in bringing factual information to be able to make sound and reasonable decisions about the incredible issues we now find ourselves facing. I also started a business in 1999 as a framing contractor building large room additions of quarter million dollars or better. I have strived to keep the reputation of myself and my company to the highest standards of performance and my integrity as a truthful, faithful advocate of my clients to protect their interests while providing a service that is second to none. My company is quite different in its approach to people (clients) I work with. Many have become friends and to this day we call or stop and visit whenever the time avails itself. As the company grew it is good to note I have never advertised or solicited for business. It came from me holding myself to the higher mark. People just keep recommending me over and over, in fact I have worked on several homes several times and there are those who will wait until I am available. And while it has grown there have been good years and tough years, feast and famine. But in it always growing in my abilities to handle what was next. In the middle of all this I was also becoming a minister in the church I was in at the time and took to doing prison ministry. My wife and I and a few others would go and give encouragement to men who needed an encouraging word and a healed heart. To clarify something I was not an angel myself growing up. My life was an up and down fight of alcohol and drugs and ran with some of the most hardcore outlaws which had caused me to eventually lose my wife of 18 years and for over 7 years we were separated and divorced and I was completely undone as a man can be, but it came to an end one month in 1993 when there  was nothing left in me except to cry out to God to forgive and help me. So I came to have my prodigal son experience that was the end of my other life.  As I started the long walk back home I could feel myself being healed in my heart and mind. My thoughts became clear and a purpose which always seemed to be in heart and my mind came to start manifesting itself. I seem to be on a path not of my own doing but on it I was. After a few years of growing in different churches my ex wife and I (which I never thought would happen) got remarried, which has been the greatest blessing I can ever recall. To have restored that which you love the most after having lost it is the most precious thing that can happen to a man. Then after leading men’s ministries and then soon after becoming a minister, my wife and I started a prison ministry. As that went on (and the story gets stranger)J a man whom I have known for years, who I eventually baptized he, his wife and daughter, came to me and told me he really was wanted to buy  me a church and he did. That was in 2004 and we are still going strong after many baptisms and many changes we are still going. I explain this to let you know why I hold myself to such a high level of integrity. Because I have been shown much mercy and it says one who has been forgiven much he loves much and I do.  Now as my business has grown, which started out in the Framing Remodeling field (residential) it has gone to grow into a large upper end full service contracting company for residential additions which have ranged from quarter million to over three hundred and fifty thousand dollars range and now includes large commercial remodels and new builds of over five million dollars. Which includes budgets, schedules, purchasing and a whatever it take attitude. The growth rate is phenomenal. And I am very thankful always, it has grown from me and couple of people to a full field of superintendents, lead carpenters, carpenters and laborers along with a full office staff with an office manager, her secretary along with my personal assistant who helps me with our bidding, contracts and project scheduling of existing projects and future ones.  Also as a Limited Liability Corporation we have had to form a board to make decisions on all company matters such as spending, quarterly reports and projections of future growth along with the company’s long term goals and how to achieve them. But even as things were you know how life will be, and I was diagnosed with cancer back in Nov 2005 and had to face some tough decisions. Something like this will always show you where you are and what you are made of and my while wife and I have faced many battles but this one was going to be rough. But then the church along with the community and some very dear people in this city came to our support. Emotionally it was rough, financially it was devastating even with great insurance, and spiritually it was a growing experience as unexplainable as it is I would come to love. After the operation to remove the cancer I was treated and then had to wait for months as the results would come in. After every test you would be on edge waiting for the results, then more tests and more waiting. But two things I want to say how even in the midst of the storm you can grow. I set my resolve to believe on God whatever the results would be and in that I was told as I took my treatment I was better than any they had seen. (Even rode my Harley to treatments) I would come in say hello to the young people who were treating me with a smile and just get my treatment and go home. Now that’s not to say it was not the most painful thing I have ever faced, for it was.  And I missed a few treatments because of the pain and the extreme fatigue I felt. But faced it I did with faith. And was told I was what they in the oncology world call an outliner, someone who is outside the lines of known statistics. Our church family, our community, our friends and family took care of us till the results had come back and as far as the Doctors are concern I am fully recovered. My wife and I have come to be at home here, but we really wanted to be close the church which is in Bastrop, so we thought we wanted to move. So we placed a sign in the yard. Then came the transmission lines in August 2006 which have been destined to go right through our city, so after a city council meeting one night which did not bode well with many citizens I took it upon myself to gather the names of all the people at the meeting that night and after a few emails and phone calls soon called a meeting and then soon after  we citizens formed a group called the Hutto Citizens Group and have been a positive force of information gathering and passionate civic responsibility on many issues facing this city.  I was nominated and voted in and I am still presently the President of the Hutto Citizens Group of which I am most proud.  I have met many people, many good people who have poured their time, money and heart into this and I am honored to know them. The sign in our yard to sell was removed and when asked why I told them I cannot leave a place that has been so good to me and mine while it is in trouble. I have never walked away from a fight and was not going to start now. I feel my qualifications as a Pastor, successful businessman and a civic leader of this community shows my heart and I believe my life shows my beliefs.  But it is my life on an everyday basis and my actions as I have interacted in my church, business and the community as a whole which will give you a clear picture of WHO IS BEAR.   Be blessed always Steven (Bear) Salfelder