Why I love Clintonville

When we launched the WRI fundraising campaign last summer, the goal was to raise funds to help complete the renovation project. We also sought to build community while the community center was being built--by involving lots of people, raising the visibility of the project and helping lay the foundation for a vibrant, active community center.

Two of the latest Whetstone fundraisers really exemplify this community spirit. On August 23, Maple Grove United Methodist Church hosted a Moonlight and Magic dinner, with proceeds to benefit the community center. It was a sold-out event, with 140 attendees who enjoyed--by all accounts--a wonderful evening of food, music and magic. It was organized entirely independently of the WRI committee, as was their Chili Cook-off benefit last fall. As Reverend Coy said, helping the community is "what we do."

This summer, some of Kenworth Road's younger residents have hosted two lemonade stands to benefit the community center. As frequent users of the center, they wanted to get involved and help with the fundraising effort. Their final lemonade stand of the season is planned for September--keep an eye out if walking or driving by!

As an all-volunteer effort, there have been times when our ideas have outstripped our resources or our follow-through has been slow (if you're waiting for a thank you note, bear with us! We're working on it!). But the willingness of so many people to get involved and be a part of this project is inspiring.

You can measure the commitment to this project by the roll call on the left column--the names of the individuals, families and businesses that have bought bricks or contributed to the fundraising. You can also measure that commitment by the time, energy and events that have been a part of this community (center) building project.

Here's a list to try to capture some of the events, activities and partners involved in this project since the Whetstone renovation groundbreaking last June. Given the breadth of activity over this past year, this is likely an incomplete list--I'm posting it in part to get feedback on necessary revisions and updates. So I apologize in advance for any omissions or mistakes--I'll edit this posting with updates as they come in.

EVENTS: To raise awareness of the campaign and promote individual gifts and brick sales, we staffed tables at community events, including: Cruise the Ville, Farmer's Market (three different dates this year), July 4th Breakfast, North on the Fourth, Rose Festival and Clintonville Education Fair. We also helped organize the public groundbreaking ceremony in June of 2007.

PRESENTATIONS/PUBLIC AWARENESS: Over the past year, we also talked to community groups, including the North Area Realtors Association, Kiwanis Club, Chamber of Commerce and Clintonville Area Commission. We put brick order forms in a number of stores and distributed flyers and posters about various events to targeted audiences. In addition, with the help of approximately 75 volunteers, we stuffed 12,000(!) bags with Clintonville directories that feature the community center project, plus included a flyer about the fundraising. We launched a Web site plus this blog, and started emailing monthly updates in the spring. We wrote three different columns for The Booster and benefited from extensive coverage in both The Booster and This Week.

FUNDRAISERS: We hosted--or benefited from--a number of fundraisers: Maple Grove's Moonlight & Magic Dinner; Byrne's Pub Benefit with Todd May and Erika Carey & the Calamities; three different preview parties; two street party benefits (Longview and Amazon); strawberry shortcake sales at the Rose Festival; the Clintonville Homes Tour; Shop Clintonville's Holiday Open House; the Clintonville Art League's holiday sale; Maple Grove's Chili Cook-off; Studio 35's benefit movies on non-school days (four different dates); the Kiwanis Soccer Snack Tent (12 different dates! what dedication!) and last year's climbing wall at Cruise the 'Ville. Plus let's not forget the neighborhood kids who held lemonade stands and the home-schooled students who held a bake sale.

All of this took thousands of hours of volunteer time. And let me just mention that the project is not yet over! We still have some fundraising to do, a playground to install and a patio to build (see next posting for more details). But as the building re-opens soon, it's worth celebrating the support that the community has shown for this project. This bodes well for the center's new name: Whetstone Community Center.