WS Chronicle

For his generosity and dedication to uplift the community during the fourth annual Living Your Best Life Speaker Series last week, Winston-Salem native Jeff Smith was awarded the Best Life award.

The Living Your Best Life Speaker Series event is a community luncheon that benefits Trellis Supportive Care, formerly Hospice & Palliative CareCenter. The annual event, which features keynote speakers from around the world, is designed to significantly impact people’s lives, bring energy to our community, and encourage us to ask ourselves: “Am I living my best life?”

This year’s honoree, Jeff Smith, is better known throughout the community as Smitty. In 1997 Smith launched Smitty’s Notes, a website and monthly newsletter that prides itself on providing information on local events and a community calendar. What started out as a simple email to friends with a list of happenings in the city, has grown to become one the most powerful and comprehensive information sources in Forsyth County. Today Smitty’s Notes has more than 16,000 subscribers. 

During an interview with The Chronicle, Smith said the timing during which he started the newsletter played a major role in the success of Smitty’s Notes. He said, “Things were happening so fast and we had a lot of new people coming into the community that didn’t know where to find stuff, so I think that’s why my newsletter has been successful, because of the timing. We had a lot of new people come in and it helped show them the way.”

Along with his contributions to the community with his newsletter, over the years Smith has still found time to serve on various boards geared toward uplifting the community as well. 

After he was presented the Best Life award during the annual luncheon held at the Benton Convention Center on Wednesday, Sept. 25, Smith thanked Trellis, his family and others throughout the community for supporting him and Smitty’s Notes over the years. As he made his way to the stage, a video tribute featuring several stakeholders thanking Smith for his hard work was shown.

“Most of all I’d like to thank you, Winston-Salem, for what you’ve done over the past 21 years by putting the hard work in,” Smith said. “We are now seeing what we have bared as far as fruit and that hard work many people have given contributions to that.”

Formerly Hospice & Palliative CareCenter, Trellis Supportive Care has been providing care since 1979 and is the first hospice provider in the state and the largest nonprofit hospice center in the Triad. Trellis Supportive Care currently serves patients in 13 counties and operates four different offices and the Kate B. Reynolds Hospice Home located here in Winston-Salem.