Downtown group hosts town hall meeting

Published 10:10 am Monday, January 23, 2006

Got an idea about downtown Dalton’s future?

You’ll have the opportunity to share it on Thursday night during a town hall meeting at City Hall sponsored by the Downtown Dalton Development Authority.

The meeting begins at 6 p.m. and is open to the public — not just downtown business or property owners — and DDDA chairwoman Kellie McBee invites everyone to attend.

“Maybe you don’t have a financial stake in downtown, but you have a stake in it if you live here,” said McBee, owner of the The Pickity Place downtown. “You’ll want to come down downtown to shop or eat. Everyone’s input is important, not just people who own property or have a business.”

The brainstorming session should help develop new ways to promote downtown along with the city’s multi-million dollar Streetscape beautification project, said Sarah Harrison, DDDA executive director.

“Sometimes something comes up that nobody has even thought about before,” Harrison said. “You get that rare spark that is just a great idea, and it’s something we can take and run with.”

Harrison expects attendees to discuss developing the old freight depot off Morris Street, improving signage directing people to downtown and holding more special events. She also hopes to recruit more volunteers.

“We definitely want them to participate in the decision-making process because it’s their downtown, too,” Harrison said. “I think what we’ll hear is the wish list of what people would like have done and what they would like to see done.”

The meeting will be hosted by two state officials: Joel Cordle, Region 1 representative from the Department of Community Affairs office of downtown development, and Paul Kreager, economic development specialist from the University of Georgia’s Fanning Institute.

Cordle and Kreager will then put the ideas together into a coordinated summary to be used to develop a working plan, Harrison said.

“You begin to notice that a lot of the ideas fall into patterns like special events, marketing, economic development or one thing or another,” Harrison said. “We can take these ideas, and this input, and formulate what’s wanted for downtown.”

As a volunteer board, McBee said the DDDA has limited time and money to invest in promoting downtown.

“This is the best way for us to understand what it is that we need to focus on as a group,” McBee said. “My motto is I’m willing to do things differently, but just don’t tell me you don’t like what I’m doing. Give me a plan. What the community wants is how we’ll set our goals for the rest of the year.”

Harrison said she doesn’t expect the meeting to turn into a gripe session and expects to hear some good ideas about downtown’s progress.

“I’m not expecting it to be so much criticism as to what hasn’t been done or what should have been done, more of what people would like to have done,” Harrison said.