Serving Maryland’s Eastern Shore and the Delmarva Peninsula

Greater Salisbury Committee -Serving as a catalyst to make our communites Better and Stronger

Serving as a Catalyst Since 1967 to Make the Salisbury Area Better and Stronger

Welcome to The Greater Salisbury Committee

The mission of the Greater Salisbury Committee is to serve as a catalyst to improve the community. Since 1967, GSC has been actively seeking sustainable solutions to the challenges that face the Greater Salisbury area. We exist at the intersection where community, people, ideas, and resources come together.


Current Initiatives

Women’s Leadership Council

The Women’s Leadership Council (WLC) serves to inspire and empower women in the greater Salisbury area to flourish through assembly and partnership, facilitating advancement of members as professional leaders in their life, work, and community. GSC was instrumental in the creation of WLC in 2021.


Water & Sewer Task Force

The GSC Water and Sewer Task Force has been working and meeting regularly since 2022. Wicomico County has approximately 18,000 septic systems. The Wicomico County Comprehensive Water and Sewer Plan includes a map of “Sewer Problem Areas” which are areas with known failures and further potential for septic system failures. The GSC Task Force has been led by two GSC members with extensive experience in the water/sewer arena: Matt Drew initially, and Rob Duma currently. Also included on the task force are representatives from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Salisbury University, Tri-County Council for the Lower Eastern Shore, Salisbury Area Chamber of Commerce, Center for Watershed Protection, and local engineers and GSC members who are interested in this significant challenge. The efforts of the task force have been widely respected and helped the Wicomico County government to create a Wicomico Sanitary Commission, and resulted in funding from Wicomico County to begin the long challenge ahead to address our water/sewer needs.


Healthy Minds for Shore

This community-based mental and behavioral health initiative began in 2023. GSC has helped facilitate a collaborative effort with key community partners to address the Lower Shore mental and behavioral health challenges. This initiative, led by Dr. Samantha Scott, is known as Healthy Minds for Shore. Its partners include GSC, Salisbury University, Wor-Wic Community College, private mental health providers; TidalHealth, Chesapeake Health Care, Wicomico County Public Schools, the Richard A. Henson Foundation, the Franklin P. and Arthur W. Perdue Foundation, the Philip and Barbara Long Family Foundation, and the Wicomico Health Department. More on the work effort and successes of this collaboration can be found here: www.healthymindsforshore.org


Housing Task Force

The Salisbury/Wicomico housing market has challenges across the board. To address those challenges, GSC has assembled a Housing Task Force, chaired by GSC member (and past GSC Chair) Bill McCain, of W. R. McCain & Associates. The task force began its work in January 2024. The goal: to provide a plan to address housing development challenges such as the lack of new neighborhoods, the condition of current housing inventory, high rents, and a shortage of affordable housing in the Salisbury/Wicomico County area. The task force is made up of realtors, affordable housing experts, builders/developers, local business owners, and others who understand that the Salisbury/Wicomico housing market is underperforming.


GSC 2030

GSC 2030 is an attempt by the GSC to do what it does best: take a critical look at the community to evaluate its opportunities and its challenges, and present potential solutions that can point our community forward. GSC 2030 endeavors to identify what lies ahead, and to identify potential solutions that can best position this community to thrive and prosper in 2030 – and beyond.

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Perdue Henson Junior Achievement Center

 

Junior Achievement of the Eastern Shore is an organization that GSC brought to Delmarva in the 1980’s. The Perdue Henson Junior Achievement Center, which opened in the Fall of 2023 in Salisbury, is a culmination of the tremendous work of JAES over the years. This new interactive/immersive facility will be visited by 10,000 students each year, from 8 school districts on Maryland’s Eastern Shore and one from Virginia’s Eastern Shore, to learn more about financial literacy. GSC is proud of its role in helping to secure lead philanthropic and state support for this $7.5 million facility. 

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Opportunity Project

The Opportunity Project is a collaborative GSC initiative with many of our area’s most significant businesses and organizations: Salisbury University, Wor-Wic Community College, City of Salisbury, Salisbury Area Chamber of Commerce, TidalHealth, Perdue Farms, Wicomico County Public Schools, and the Wicomico County Education Foundation. The goal is to bring new executive level hires from these significant local employers together two times a year. It’s meant as a way to share with those executives and their new employers all of the opportunities that this area offers.


Transformational Community Leadership (TCL)

Transformational Community Leadership Series

TCL is an immersive leadership series, launched by GSC in April 2017, that is held every two years in partnership with Salisbury University. The goal of TCL is to engage future Salisbury area leaders in learning about the industries, institutions, and entities that are the backbone of our community. Every month for 8 consecutive months, TCL participants take field trips to learn more about these community and regional assets. At the conclusion of each monthly visit, exceptional leadership speakers share insights with the TCL cohort.


Offshore Wind

GSC is playing a strong regional role in advancing the Offshore Wind industry, working closely with the two entities who are bringing Offshore Wind energy to Maryland: Orsted and US Wind. We believe our region can be a key player in the Operations and Maintenance supply chain that will be needed over the next 20 years as Offshore Wind comes to the area. Orsted and US Wind will bring the largest wind turbines in the world off the coast of Ocean City in the next five years.


Greater Salisbury Committee -Serving as a catalyst to make our communites Better and Stronger

In The News

Arcon Training Center signs Contract with AIS (Advanced Insustrial Solutions)

Arcon Training Center has signed a contract with AIS (Advanced Industrial Solutions), one of the UK’s premier training providers, to open a specialized training facility…

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Pirate’s Wharf to transform into 340-acre park with trails, more that preserve nature

Pirate’s Wharf, a western Wicomico County property with a rich history reaching back to the 1600’s, has been mostly farm fields and state-designated critical wetlands…

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Henry S. Parker Athletic Field Seven and a Half

On Wednesday, Perdue Farms representatives presented a $150,000 grant from the Franklin P. and Arthur W. Perdue Foundation to Wicomico County officials to help fund construction of…

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