Minutes: September 2013 meeting

[Christel Manning]

The Economic Development group met on Monday, Sept. 9, 2013, from 6-7:30 pm at 333 Front Street. Present: Lisa Fitch, Don, Nathalie, Melissa Waldron, Brett, Mark, Lee, Christel   

Items discussed:

1. Planning for Riverfest 2014. We reviewed the ideas we developed during our debriefing of Riverfest 2013. The longest lead item is fund raising and advertising, so we focused on that. We brainstormed a list of possible sponsors, including: Start Bank, Mary Wade Home, AMR, Fair Haven Furniture, Vespoli, Grand Vin, Sporting Goods retailers that sell kayaks, Yale New Haven Hospital, the New Haven Economic Development Corporation, and local realtors like Pierce and Caldwell Banker. We also developed a list of additional organizations (beyond those who came last year) who may want to have a presence at the festival. Maybe the Fire Department could bring their boat. It would also be nice to display some art, so maybe Arte and/or one of the local glass blowers or wood carvers. Finally, we discussed advertising. Media outlets to contact include: CT Magazine, Daily Nutmeg, New Haven Magazine, the Independent, the Advocate, Info New Haven, and local TV stations. We plan to do flyers again, but flyers serve more as a reminder to back up other kinds of ads. A banner across Grand Avenue would be ideal, if we can raise the funds. And all agreed that getting TV coverage helped tremendously. Goal for October meeting is to create a media packet we can use to get coverage and sponsorship. Packet will include press release plus any positive media coverage we got this year. Lee will send press release he created last year to Christel. Melissa will create a URL so we can have a page for Riverfest 2014. Once Christel has all the content, she will work with Melissa to put it on the page.
2. Dining Out Night will be Thursday, Sept. 26, at Boat House Café.
3. Soup Night will be at Melissa’s house, either Oct. 20 or 27. Christel will co-host.
4. Improving Middletown entrance to Clinton Ave and Front street. Christel filled out grant application to United Way to participate in their Day of Caring. If accepted, UW will send us 25 volunteers to help beautify those areas on a Saturday in October.
5. Strong School update: The project continues with its positive momentum. Next step is to create a non-profit corporation (501-C3) in order to take over the building, and set up a board of directors for that. The city did the environmental assessment, and it seems there are some issues (lead paint, etc.) but none of them are major.
6. Announcements: Melissa is starting an afternoon program for kids aged 10 and up.