a friend who likes to tell me frequently
tell me something I don’t already know
he does that whenever I’m preparing to
talk or a presentation and that’s a very
pressure thing because how do you tell
somehow you know you’re telling somebody
something they don’t already know but
there’s no pressure today because I have
no intention of telling you things you
don’t know I intend to tell you things
you already do know things that are
common sense things that are obvious
things that you may have tucked away in
your mental attic that need to be
brought out dusted off and repurposed
for a positive for a positive force
so that’s where I’m going to go today
the talk the title is mobilizing
communities to save their Main streets
we know we know what happened to Main
streets in America I think the reason
I’m here is because as a you just heard
I spearheaded the organization called
raising the bar which one the national
small business revolution contest last
year a million online votes were cast
and we want and we did it with the help
of a lot of people in the region we
appreciate that so I’m here to talk
about Main streets and what’s happened
to Main Street you know the story of
Main streets across America the story of
Main streets across America pretty much
parallels what happened as the United
States moved from an industrial to a
post-industrial society the factories
closed of jobs dried up people moved out
of small towns people moved to the
suburbs and Main streets they didn’t die
but they went into a pretty deep sleep
fortunately some government agencies did
not lose interest in Main streets and
did not give up on us the United States
Department of the Interior of the
Pennsylvania Department of Community and
Economic Development the Bucks County
Planning Commission the Delaware Valley
Regional Planning Commission they all
have wonderful plans programs how many
of you have ever said it to one of those
vision sessions where you sit around and
talk about gee what could our town
really be like and what can our Main
Street really realizing they’re nice and
there’s good plants out there that you
can adopt I’m not here today to talk to
you about what kind of plan you should
adopt that’s your decision for your town
your assets are I am here to talk about
the ingredient that those plans leave
out and what they leave out the most
important thing is you the most
important thing in mobilizing any of
these plans is to dedicate it for civil
servants civilians who are civic minded
people who want to get involved and want
to step up and that’s what I want to
talk about today how to do that I’ve
developed an acronym I’m Italian so I
called it Rome
I could have repurposed the letter to
reorganize the letters but it stands for
how to recruit organized mobilize and
empower people like you and me to get
involved I get I get weary of people who
complain about oh you know in our town
there’s so much apathy people don’t want
to step up people don’t care I don’t
believe that at all I believe that every
small town in America has very good
people who want to get involved if
they’re empowered if they’re recruited
if they’re made to feel welcome and and
if they are they’re willing to give
their time talent and their financial
resources sometimes that’s the important
tip so we developed our plan we had a
core group of people and we selected a
plan and the very first thing we did and
I think it’s important that every small
town do this and that’s to talk to your
local government you know local
government officials have the toughest
job in America just ask him a note idea
because they do they can’t go to the
grocery store to buy a quart of milk
without hearing about potholes and
streetlights that are broken there’s no
removal and trash pickup and all those
problems and it’s not fun and you don’t
run for office to fix a pothole you run
for office to be visionary to make a
meaningful change in your town I’d like
to make the analogy of a school
administrator who gets up in the morning
can’t wait to go to school so he can
affect people’s lives if he can inspire
and motivate and encourage and he gets
into the building and he realizes the
roof leak the night before and there
goes his day that’s what he has to do
and that’s no fun be quite often that’s
the life of a local official so what we
did and it’s very important to do is we
meant then to say look we’re not here in
an adversarial way we’re not
in a confrontational way but criticized
we’re here to help we’re here to help
you do the things you wish you can do
every day because it’s an awesome job
and you know what most likely they’re
gone they’re not going to believe you at
first because we when you get criticized
as much as local officials do there’s a
good chance you start getting a little
callous you start getting a little
defensive you start getting a little
suspicious of every group that pops up
and what’s their long-range political
goals you need to convince them of it
you don’t just convince them with your
words you convince them with your
actions moving forward so we worked hard
to form a partnership between local
government and our civic group the next
thing we had to address was the idea of
branding branding is so important in
marketing and we were actually out to
market our town and to market ourselves
to the people that we wanted to get
involved so you have to pick a name
someone suggested why we call ourselves
the revitalization committee that was
dead on arrival to be rebuffed refs
first well I’ve been I’ve been around a
while I’ve been on about five or six
revitalization committees and it has a
connotation to it that you’re just about
dead and you need resuscitation you need
CPR it’s not the message you want to
send free for your town so we
brainstormed some names and we came up
the name raising the bar we liked it
because it has a connotation of effort
has a connotation of something positive
it has a connotation of an ongoing thing
not just the idea that a person’s reach
should exceed their grasp so because
they’re raising the bar a volunteer said
how about this for a logo we said sure
why not
so that became our brand that became our
logo that became our name and I think
any small town wishing to move forward
and and motivate people you need to
consider that marketing part of a name
and an envelope something visual the
next thing we talked about was how do we
convince people that this is just not
one of those failed efforts that comes
up every couple of years for people
getting involved they’re going to change
things and oh nothing really happens so
we said let’s demonstration I think the
people need a visual demonstration
something tangible but something good
was going to happen so we went back to
the Barrow again and we said you got a
making piece of land right at the right
at the entrance of
commercial district which is called Mill
Street how about letting us use the land
we want to build up this build a
structure that will be a symbolic
gateway not only to the street but to
the future of our town to the future
change of our town and they said sure go
ahead so we started out to raise money
my wife and I sold $30,000 worth of
bricks which told us which we’ll talk
about in a minute we use the funds to
build a structure and you want to do
some other things for seed money moving
forward but that effort showed two
things it showed the public that
something tangible was happening wasn’t
a big deal but it was something tangible
they could look at and say I’d like that
and what it showed us is that there are
people out there that want to
participate as we sold this idea they
bought in literally with their financial
support there’s a guy named Jim Collins
who wrote a book several years ago
called good to great it was focused
mainly on corporations on how you get a
good corporation or a good organization
to greatness and we thought there was
some relevant pieces of that that would
apply to us and one of the things you
talked about was you wanted you want to
enhance your organization you got to get
the right people on the bus and once you
get the people on the bus you got to get
them in the right seats so we didn’t
want a metaphorical bus full of people
we wanted a whole damn Caravan so we set
out to recruit people as much as we
could and it’s not an easy task as those
of you who are involved in civic groups
probably not we saw three challenges
that that are applicable to any small
town in recruiting people to get
involved the first one is people often
feel like you really not want it that
you whether it goes back to middle
school and they weren’t in the clique or
when they got cut from the basketball
team or whatever it is there’s an
inherent thing in some people is that
they don’t want me it’s a clique it’s a
separate group they don’t want me to be
part of that we had to convince people
we all have to convince people we do
want you we want everyone who wants to
step up and get involved the second
thing we think that would deter people
from getting involved is they’re afraid
of what I’m gonna get sucked into how
much time is it going to be I want to
get involved in my town but I’m busy and
I’m
I want to commit myself and then not be
able to get out so that’s an important
thing to consider and the third thing is
there are people who felt I want to get
involved but I’m not sure I have these
skills to offer you I don’t know how to
do the kinds of things perhaps you need
done so we adopted a motto and this
became our sales pitch to everyone we
wanted to recruit we said do only what
you enjoy doing for only the amount of
time you enjoy doing it and we meant it
and when we will be advertised for a
volunteer we said we want to hang flower
baskets on the street we’d say who can
help for one hour on Saturday and when
that buzzer went off music go home
we’ve done enough for today and that
that caught on two people got involved
so that’s an important thing one thing
about small towns is they have a lot of
roots there’s a lot of families that go
back generations and you know you have
new people moving into town you have
people that don’t have those roots and
it’s verka when I talk to people I hear
a lot of them say you know it’s tough to
break in to town it’s tough to be
accepted or become part of the social
circle or whatever so you have to be
cognizant of that and welcome newcomers
and I mean really welcoming one I
remember we were having a UH
a meeting we’re gonna have a town-wide
clean up when we waited people to come
for the money to get involved in the
planning of it we had 20 people show up
and I know some people didn’t know each
other so I said let me go around the
room like a Tupperware party and say
just say who you are in one sentence
about yourself the first person said you
know I’m John Doe and I’ve lived in
Bristol all my life the second person
said I’m Suzy Smith and I lived in
Brussels for the last 15 years I said
stop I said we don’t care if you’ve
lived in Bristol for 15 years or 15
minutes if you want to get involved if
you want to do something positive if you
want to step up we’ve got a place for
you and we worked hard to convince
people with that the other thing I want
to talk about is an age inclusion you
know everybody talks about yeah we got
to get the we get young people involved
you have to get the Millennials and five
and that’s great and we do we need to
get young people about need to get the
Millennials involved this town isn’t for
old people you know what we learned
something in winning this national
contest we invented a new word there are
no senior citizen bristle we call them
friends
okay so we have Millennials and
perennials wanna both involved I can
tell you that the people that carry the
ball I mean everybody voted in a million
votes kiss and all everybody voted
online several times as you’re allowed
but the people that showed up every day
to say what can I do to help what do you
need done today what would you need to
strip it where people whose average age
would qualify for AARP so don’t overlook
the value of your older perennials in
town they have experience they have a
knowledge that a skill that they can
bring to the table and I think most
important they live a life in in the
private sector or wherever they were and
they’re looking for some fulfillment in
retirement you give them something good
to do and don’t feel fulfilled and it’ll
be a good workers for you so you gotta
include them all the next day to make
sure your organization is it because
aware of this don’t develop a big
bureaucracy we don’t have a bureaucracy
and raising the bar we have a
meritocracy you show up we have a board
here we have to pay bills we have to pay
insurance we have to raise money and we
have a board to do that but basically
when we deal with our larger group you
show up you say you’re gonna do
something if you do it man you’re a
superstar if you don’t we understand so
we have people rising up so all the time
and that’s what we value we have a new
person just the other day we’re doing a
fundraiser next week and we needed
somebody to recruit baskets for a raffle
and she said I’ll try it and she do to
tell she came back with 20 basket she
got started okay that’s important
the other thing is in a small town you
know I’ve talked to your rotary groups
Lions Clubs they’re shrinking good
people who have done very good things
but they’re shrinking and we were
cognizant of that and we said let’s have
a leadership practice we invited two
people from every organization in town
that we could think of service clubs
historic societies fire houses literally
everywhere in the library using every
organization we to think of said sense
of people let’s get together for a
breakfast and we promise you’ll be
finished by 8:30 to go to work
and we met and we talked about how can
we take those artists our collective
desire to do good things in child and
how can we cooperate how can we do some
things jointly how can we team up with
some projects and let’s share our emails
and our phone numbers so that when we
want to communicate something I could
push a button and notify the president
of every organization and they can push
another button and notify all their
membership that’s a powerful thing so we
did that and I encourage that for small
recognize the seed planners no matter
how hard we work no matter how many good
things we’ve done currently we know that
there are people who went before us who
maybe kept us on life support when our
towns were really struggling they did
good things and if they didn’t get them
all done they really tried like heck and
we think it’s important you’re never
smarter than when you recognize somebody
else for their achievement right your
estimation of them goes up sky-high we
work very hard to recognize the people
that came before us the people that
turned an art theater for lack of a
better word by the necks rated theater
in the community to a wonderful
award-winning performing arts terrible I
mean that was a milestone moment and we
don’t want to take that for granted so
we remind people today of the things
that were done in the past as a way to
inspire them to what else can we do for
them
when you see a good idea steal it by all
means we invited a governor James Malley
from Collingswood New Jersey to come to
speak to our group and Commons was a
wonderful success story it’s a town like
ours like first over that was an old
industrial town and it’s transforming
itself it’s doing great and he was a
driving force behind us we brought on
the town we’re having a question and
answer period and they have a theater in
columns with so one of our one of our
guests said how did you get a anything
they have a theater district one theatre
a theatre district they say well how’d
you get a theater district you said what
do you mean we put up a slide to set
theater district in a sound and it
sounds cool and so we said okay let’s
let’s do that we have a wonderful
theater and we decided I just change the
name a little
we call it our cultural card or because
we have a theater in a museum and and
and monuments along the riverfront we
called the Bristol barrel cold hard or
we made literature that we could give to
tourist groups come and visit the
cultural corner which the same things
over there before and they’re wonderful
but repackage them repurpose them and
and that’s a good idea so you see any
good idea by all means steel right
imitation is the best form of flattery
building a regional network we reached
out there are so many organizations out
there and everybody wants to be
recognized everybody wants to be seen
you know so we reached out to the Silver
Lake Nature Center to depend very
society to every grouped into the up to
them to be to the lower box chamber of
Congress and the group we could to visit
Bucks County said hey we’re here this is
who we are and we want to party part of
what you are and they appreciate that
and we’ve read much more benefits than
we’ve given in time so it encouraged
that reach out if you’re not already you
recognize her at the Debbie Downer from
Saturday Night Live remember w downer
she would ruin any party any any meeting
one of my favorite skits encouraged was
a group of people are out to dinner and
they’re all happy they can’t wait to
talk to each other and one says I think
when I was staking a beer somebody
else’s yeah thinking a beer sounds good
and everybody’s gonna have a stake in a
beer and Debbie says well I would have
won but then I’ve been reading about mad
cow disease and I think I’m going to
pass on okay when you see a boo bird
because you know what they are you know
there are people out there that will
shoot holes and anything you want to do
that will criticize you from their couch
without getting off it just run away
from the moustached you can you have one
in a meeting thank them politely and
show them the door because you’ve got
work to do
we don’t have time for naysayers now
there’s a difference between accepting
legitimate criticism in having different
points of view that’s one thing well
once you get the feeling this isn’t
working well and don’t spend your time
on social media or arguing with the
naysayers
you have you don’t have enough time to
do that spend your time doing the
positive things you believe in and the
naysayers will drift away the toughest
thing is when you have some success
we’ve had some success it’s sustaining
it to keeping the dream alive keeping
the puzzle I say you know we won this
wonderful contest half a million dollars
we’ve got national recognition we’ve
been part of an eight part video series
on on an on a cable network say like
that but and that’s great that can’t be
the peak that was yesterday we need to
move forward we need to do more good
things you need to keep people who lose
so remember the most important parts of
your towns that management is not the
plan it’s the people so best of luck and thank you for having
tell me something I don’t already know
he does that whenever I’m preparing to
talk or a presentation and that’s a very
pressure thing because how do you tell
somehow you know you’re telling somebody
something they don’t already know but
there’s no pressure today because I have
no intention of telling you things you
don’t know I intend to tell you things
you already do know things that are
common sense things that are obvious
things that you may have tucked away in
your mental attic that need to be
brought out dusted off and repurposed
for a positive for a positive force
so that’s where I’m going to go today
the talk the title is mobilizing
communities to save their Main streets
we know we know what happened to Main
streets in America I think the reason
I’m here is because as a you just heard
I spearheaded the organization called
raising the bar which one the national
small business revolution contest last
year a million online votes were cast
and we want and we did it with the help
of a lot of people in the region we
appreciate that so I’m here to talk
about Main streets and what’s happened
to Main Street you know the story of
Main streets across America the story of
Main streets across America pretty much
parallels what happened as the United
States moved from an industrial to a
post-industrial society the factories
closed of jobs dried up people moved out
of small towns people moved to the
suburbs and Main streets they didn’t die
but they went into a pretty deep sleep
fortunately some government agencies did
not lose interest in Main streets and
did not give up on us the United States
Department of the Interior of the
Pennsylvania Department of Community and
Economic Development the Bucks County
Planning Commission the Delaware Valley
Regional Planning Commission they all
have wonderful plans programs how many
of you have ever said it to one of those
vision sessions where you sit around and
talk about gee what could our town
really be like and what can our Main
Street really realizing they’re nice and
there’s good plants out there that you
can adopt I’m not here today to talk to
you about what kind of plan you should
adopt that’s your decision for your town
your assets are I am here to talk about
the ingredient that those plans leave
out and what they leave out the most
important thing is you the most
important thing in mobilizing any of
these plans is to dedicate it for civil
servants civilians who are civic minded
people who want to get involved and want
to step up and that’s what I want to
talk about today how to do that I’ve
developed an acronym I’m Italian so I
called it Rome
I could have repurposed the letter to
reorganize the letters but it stands for
how to recruit organized mobilize and
empower people like you and me to get
involved I get I get weary of people who
complain about oh you know in our town
there’s so much apathy people don’t want
to step up people don’t care I don’t
believe that at all I believe that every
small town in America has very good
people who want to get involved if
they’re empowered if they’re recruited
if they’re made to feel welcome and and
if they are they’re willing to give
their time talent and their financial
resources sometimes that’s the important
tip so we developed our plan we had a
core group of people and we selected a
plan and the very first thing we did and
I think it’s important that every small
town do this and that’s to talk to your
local government you know local
government officials have the toughest
job in America just ask him a note idea
because they do they can’t go to the
grocery store to buy a quart of milk
without hearing about potholes and
streetlights that are broken there’s no
removal and trash pickup and all those
problems and it’s not fun and you don’t
run for office to fix a pothole you run
for office to be visionary to make a
meaningful change in your town I’d like
to make the analogy of a school
administrator who gets up in the morning
can’t wait to go to school so he can
affect people’s lives if he can inspire
and motivate and encourage and he gets
into the building and he realizes the
roof leak the night before and there
goes his day that’s what he has to do
and that’s no fun be quite often that’s
the life of a local official so what we
did and it’s very important to do is we
meant then to say look we’re not here in
an adversarial way we’re not
in a confrontational way but criticized
we’re here to help we’re here to help
you do the things you wish you can do
every day because it’s an awesome job
and you know what most likely they’re
gone they’re not going to believe you at
first because we when you get criticized
as much as local officials do there’s a
good chance you start getting a little
callous you start getting a little
defensive you start getting a little
suspicious of every group that pops up
and what’s their long-range political
goals you need to convince them of it
you don’t just convince them with your
words you convince them with your
actions moving forward so we worked hard
to form a partnership between local
government and our civic group the next
thing we had to address was the idea of
branding branding is so important in
marketing and we were actually out to
market our town and to market ourselves
to the people that we wanted to get
involved so you have to pick a name
someone suggested why we call ourselves
the revitalization committee that was
dead on arrival to be rebuffed refs
first well I’ve been I’ve been around a
while I’ve been on about five or six
revitalization committees and it has a
connotation to it that you’re just about
dead and you need resuscitation you need
CPR it’s not the message you want to
send free for your town so we
brainstormed some names and we came up
the name raising the bar we liked it
because it has a connotation of effort
has a connotation of something positive
it has a connotation of an ongoing thing
not just the idea that a person’s reach
should exceed their grasp so because
they’re raising the bar a volunteer said
how about this for a logo we said sure
why not
so that became our brand that became our
logo that became our name and I think
any small town wishing to move forward
and and motivate people you need to
consider that marketing part of a name
and an envelope something visual the
next thing we talked about was how do we
convince people that this is just not
one of those failed efforts that comes
up every couple of years for people
getting involved they’re going to change
things and oh nothing really happens so
we said let’s demonstration I think the
people need a visual demonstration
something tangible but something good
was going to happen so we went back to
the Barrow again and we said you got a
making piece of land right at the right
at the entrance of
commercial district which is called Mill
Street how about letting us use the land
we want to build up this build a
structure that will be a symbolic
gateway not only to the street but to
the future of our town to the future
change of our town and they said sure go
ahead so we started out to raise money
my wife and I sold $30,000 worth of
bricks which told us which we’ll talk
about in a minute we use the funds to
build a structure and you want to do
some other things for seed money moving
forward but that effort showed two
things it showed the public that
something tangible was happening wasn’t
a big deal but it was something tangible
they could look at and say I’d like that
and what it showed us is that there are
people out there that want to
participate as we sold this idea they
bought in literally with their financial
support there’s a guy named Jim Collins
who wrote a book several years ago
called good to great it was focused
mainly on corporations on how you get a
good corporation or a good organization
to greatness and we thought there was
some relevant pieces of that that would
apply to us and one of the things you
talked about was you wanted you want to
enhance your organization you got to get
the right people on the bus and once you
get the people on the bus you got to get
them in the right seats so we didn’t
want a metaphorical bus full of people
we wanted a whole damn Caravan so we set
out to recruit people as much as we
could and it’s not an easy task as those
of you who are involved in civic groups
probably not we saw three challenges
that that are applicable to any small
town in recruiting people to get
involved the first one is people often
feel like you really not want it that
you whether it goes back to middle
school and they weren’t in the clique or
when they got cut from the basketball
team or whatever it is there’s an
inherent thing in some people is that
they don’t want me it’s a clique it’s a
separate group they don’t want me to be
part of that we had to convince people
we all have to convince people we do
want you we want everyone who wants to
step up and get involved the second
thing we think that would deter people
from getting involved is they’re afraid
of what I’m gonna get sucked into how
much time is it going to be I want to
get involved in my town but I’m busy and
I’m
I want to commit myself and then not be
able to get out so that’s an important
thing to consider and the third thing is
there are people who felt I want to get
involved but I’m not sure I have these
skills to offer you I don’t know how to
do the kinds of things perhaps you need
done so we adopted a motto and this
became our sales pitch to everyone we
wanted to recruit we said do only what
you enjoy doing for only the amount of
time you enjoy doing it and we meant it
and when we will be advertised for a
volunteer we said we want to hang flower
baskets on the street we’d say who can
help for one hour on Saturday and when
that buzzer went off music go home
we’ve done enough for today and that
that caught on two people got involved
so that’s an important thing one thing
about small towns is they have a lot of
roots there’s a lot of families that go
back generations and you know you have
new people moving into town you have
people that don’t have those roots and
it’s verka when I talk to people I hear
a lot of them say you know it’s tough to
break in to town it’s tough to be
accepted or become part of the social
circle or whatever so you have to be
cognizant of that and welcome newcomers
and I mean really welcoming one I
remember we were having a UH
a meeting we’re gonna have a town-wide
clean up when we waited people to come
for the money to get involved in the
planning of it we had 20 people show up
and I know some people didn’t know each
other so I said let me go around the
room like a Tupperware party and say
just say who you are in one sentence
about yourself the first person said you
know I’m John Doe and I’ve lived in
Bristol all my life the second person
said I’m Suzy Smith and I lived in
Brussels for the last 15 years I said
stop I said we don’t care if you’ve
lived in Bristol for 15 years or 15
minutes if you want to get involved if
you want to do something positive if you
want to step up we’ve got a place for
you and we worked hard to convince
people with that the other thing I want
to talk about is an age inclusion you
know everybody talks about yeah we got
to get the we get young people involved
you have to get the Millennials and five
and that’s great and we do we need to
get young people about need to get the
Millennials involved this town isn’t for
old people you know what we learned
something in winning this national
contest we invented a new word there are
no senior citizen bristle we call them
friends
okay so we have Millennials and
perennials wanna both involved I can
tell you that the people that carry the
ball I mean everybody voted in a million
votes kiss and all everybody voted
online several times as you’re allowed
but the people that showed up every day
to say what can I do to help what do you
need done today what would you need to
strip it where people whose average age
would qualify for AARP so don’t overlook
the value of your older perennials in
town they have experience they have a
knowledge that a skill that they can
bring to the table and I think most
important they live a life in in the
private sector or wherever they were and
they’re looking for some fulfillment in
retirement you give them something good
to do and don’t feel fulfilled and it’ll
be a good workers for you so you gotta
include them all the next day to make
sure your organization is it because
aware of this don’t develop a big
bureaucracy we don’t have a bureaucracy
and raising the bar we have a
meritocracy you show up we have a board
here we have to pay bills we have to pay
insurance we have to raise money and we
have a board to do that but basically
when we deal with our larger group you
show up you say you’re gonna do
something if you do it man you’re a
superstar if you don’t we understand so
we have people rising up so all the time
and that’s what we value we have a new
person just the other day we’re doing a
fundraiser next week and we needed
somebody to recruit baskets for a raffle
and she said I’ll try it and she do to
tell she came back with 20 basket she
got started okay that’s important
the other thing is in a small town you
know I’ve talked to your rotary groups
Lions Clubs they’re shrinking good
people who have done very good things
but they’re shrinking and we were
cognizant of that and we said let’s have
a leadership practice we invited two
people from every organization in town
that we could think of service clubs
historic societies fire houses literally
everywhere in the library using every
organization we to think of said sense
of people let’s get together for a
breakfast and we promise you’ll be
finished by 8:30 to go to work
and we met and we talked about how can
we take those artists our collective
desire to do good things in child and
how can we cooperate how can we do some
things jointly how can we team up with
some projects and let’s share our emails
and our phone numbers so that when we
want to communicate something I could
push a button and notify the president
of every organization and they can push
another button and notify all their
membership that’s a powerful thing so we
did that and I encourage that for small
recognize the seed planners no matter
how hard we work no matter how many good
things we’ve done currently we know that
there are people who went before us who
maybe kept us on life support when our
towns were really struggling they did
good things and if they didn’t get them
all done they really tried like heck and
we think it’s important you’re never
smarter than when you recognize somebody
else for their achievement right your
estimation of them goes up sky-high we
work very hard to recognize the people
that came before us the people that
turned an art theater for lack of a
better word by the necks rated theater
in the community to a wonderful
award-winning performing arts terrible I
mean that was a milestone moment and we
don’t want to take that for granted so
we remind people today of the things
that were done in the past as a way to
inspire them to what else can we do for
them
when you see a good idea steal it by all
means we invited a governor James Malley
from Collingswood New Jersey to come to
speak to our group and Commons was a
wonderful success story it’s a town like
ours like first over that was an old
industrial town and it’s transforming
itself it’s doing great and he was a
driving force behind us we brought on
the town we’re having a question and
answer period and they have a theater in
columns with so one of our one of our
guests said how did you get a anything
they have a theater district one theatre
a theatre district they say well how’d
you get a theater district you said what
do you mean we put up a slide to set
theater district in a sound and it
sounds cool and so we said okay let’s
let’s do that we have a wonderful
theater and we decided I just change the
name a little
we call it our cultural card or because
we have a theater in a museum and and
and monuments along the riverfront we
called the Bristol barrel cold hard or
we made literature that we could give to
tourist groups come and visit the
cultural corner which the same things
over there before and they’re wonderful
but repackage them repurpose them and
and that’s a good idea so you see any
good idea by all means steel right
imitation is the best form of flattery
building a regional network we reached
out there are so many organizations out
there and everybody wants to be
recognized everybody wants to be seen
you know so we reached out to the Silver
Lake Nature Center to depend very
society to every grouped into the up to
them to be to the lower box chamber of
Congress and the group we could to visit
Bucks County said hey we’re here this is
who we are and we want to party part of
what you are and they appreciate that
and we’ve read much more benefits than
we’ve given in time so it encouraged
that reach out if you’re not already you
recognize her at the Debbie Downer from
Saturday Night Live remember w downer
she would ruin any party any any meeting
one of my favorite skits encouraged was
a group of people are out to dinner and
they’re all happy they can’t wait to
talk to each other and one says I think
when I was staking a beer somebody
else’s yeah thinking a beer sounds good
and everybody’s gonna have a stake in a
beer and Debbie says well I would have
won but then I’ve been reading about mad
cow disease and I think I’m going to
pass on okay when you see a boo bird
because you know what they are you know
there are people out there that will
shoot holes and anything you want to do
that will criticize you from their couch
without getting off it just run away
from the moustached you can you have one
in a meeting thank them politely and
show them the door because you’ve got
work to do
we don’t have time for naysayers now
there’s a difference between accepting
legitimate criticism in having different
points of view that’s one thing well
once you get the feeling this isn’t
working well and don’t spend your time
on social media or arguing with the
naysayers
you have you don’t have enough time to
do that spend your time doing the
positive things you believe in and the
naysayers will drift away the toughest
thing is when you have some success
we’ve had some success it’s sustaining
it to keeping the dream alive keeping
the puzzle I say you know we won this
wonderful contest half a million dollars
we’ve got national recognition we’ve
been part of an eight part video series
on on an on a cable network say like
that but and that’s great that can’t be
the peak that was yesterday we need to
move forward we need to do more good
things you need to keep people who lose
so remember the most important parts of
your towns that management is not the
plan it’s the people so best of luck and thank you for having
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