Main Street Arkansas Update - March 3, 2008

DATES TO REMEMBER:

MARCH 9-11 – GOVERNOR’S CONFERENCE ON TOURISM, ROGERS
MARCH 15 – LETTER OF AGREEMENT, WORKPLAN, ETC DUE TO MSA
MARCH 30-APRIL 2 – NATIONAL MAIN STREETS CONFERENCE, PHILADELPHIA, PA
OCTOBER 6-8, DESTINATION DOWNTOWN, BAY ST. LOUIS, MS
October 21-25 - National Trust for Historic Preservation Conference, Tulsa, OK

Nancy will be off until March 10.
Susan’s on vacation this week.

Main Street Arkansas Calendar March 3 - 7
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MONDAY Mark M. out A.M.
TUESDAY Caroline, out A.M., Greg, Batesville (board meeting, P.M.)
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
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IN THIS ISSUE:

TV SHOW ON REBUILDING GREENSBURG, KS, TOTATTLY DESTROYED BY A TORNADO
LISTSERV HIGHLIGHTS
ONLINE PROPERTY LISTINGS ON CRAIGSLIST
MCMANSIONVILLE THE NEXT SLUM?
INVITATION TO A DISCUSSION ON URBANISM
GRANT OPPORTUNITY
FUN QUOTES



The Greening of Greensburg
http://blogs.kansascity.com/tvbarn/2008/02/the-greening-of.html

If you don’t subscribe to the Main Street listserv, you’ve missed out on a great discussion of “Best Fundraisers Ever” some examples include:

The Cash Party is an evening of elegance that is not only a major fundraiser.
Showcases the enhancements and improvements of our Main Street Evening includes cocktails and dinner, along with a silent AND live auction. Auction items include framed prints, jewelry, weekend getaways, beach vacations and more. There is a grand prize of $10,000 given away at the end of the evening.
Total Raised = $36,678.74

The International Cajun Joke Telling Contest was held each year during April, National Humor Month. The event featured a competition held on an evening. We had a social hour and a sit down dinner just prior to the contest. The tickets were sold ahead of time. We also had a cash bar, and we sold promotional items such as T-shirts, etc. The contest was so popular that it sold out each year. In fact, people wanted to start buying tickets for the next year's contest as soon as the present year's was over. We also included people from other states to serve as judges. The people who attended came to our little town from many different states, just for the contest. It was amazing! The contest raised a lot of money, and it also got us a lot of good publicity from all over. The contest is now twenty years old. Now it is held every other year. So, it is still going on. Again, I think being creative in your fund rising is the key to making money,

You can access this discussion thread via the listserv archives in the members section of mainstreet.org

Main Street programs using craigslist.org for property listings
See this link for an example:
http://sfbay.craigslist.org/eby/off/580675072.html

The Next Slum:
The subprime crisis is just the tip of the iceberg. Fundamental changes in American life may turn today’s McMansions into tomorrow’s tenements.
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/200803/subprime?emc=lm&m=212836&l=18&v=40306

Invite to Urban Enthusiasts
Do you know someone who is not in a position of institutional leadership, but who has great ideas, passion and energy for their city or cities in general?
If so, CEOs for Cities would like to connect with them as we work to form a new network of urban enthusiasts who will help to build a collective national voice for city lovers. As part of this movement, they will be asked to respond with their views on a number of current issues and brainstorm new ideas for city strategies. Their opinions and ideas will be shared with CEOs for Cities members.
Click here to read the invitation to join this network (including a link to an initial survey for participants), and share it with anyone you know who would make a good addition to our efforts.

Economic Development Authority Community Development Grant Opportunity
http://www07.grants.gov/search/search.do?mode=VIEW&oppId=40747

EDA will provide Public Works investments to support the construction or rehabilitation of essential public infrastructure and facilities necessary to generate or retain private sector jobs and investments, attract private sector capital, and promote regional competitiveness, including investments that expand and upgrade infrastructure to attract new industry, support technology-led development, accelerate new business development, and enhance the ability of regions to capitalize on opportunities presented by free trade.

The Planning Program helps support planning organizations, including District Organizations and Indian Tribes, in the development, implementation, revision, or replacement of comprehensive economic development strategies (CEDS), and for related short-term planning investments and State plans designed to create and retain higher-skill, higher-wage jobs, particularly for the unemployed and underemployed in the nation’s most economically distressed regions.

From All About Cities
“Our national flower is the concrete cloverleaf”
Ahead of his time, technology historian and urban philosopher Lewis Mumford (1895-1990) grasped the paradoxes of modern life and the long term pitfalls of the urban evolution he witnessed in the 1950s and 1960s. I stumbled across some great quotes of his today:
• Forget the damned motor car and build the cities for lovers and friends.
• Restore human legs as a means of travel. Pedestrians rely on food for fuel and need no special parking facilities.
• The chief function of the city is to convert power into form, energy into culture, dead matter into the living symbols of art, biological reproduction into social creativity.
• New York is the perfect model of a city, not the model of a perfect city.
• Our national flower is the concrete cloverleaf.