INFORMATION 1Rivers Edge Meeting Minutes Wednesday May 9, 2012
The meeting was called to order at 2:30PM in the Arts Alliance Meeting Room at 312 Jackson Ave.
Present were: Dave Raymond Arts Alliance, Justin Femrite Elk River City Engineer, Steve Johnson ower
309 Jackson Ave. ,Jim Soderberg Granite Shores, Jennifer Open Reel Media, Earl Falk Granite Shores,
John Stander Arts Alliance, Marcy VanValkenburg Elk River Travel, Tanna Anderson First National
Financial, Tamara Ackerman Avalon Salon, Wendy Simenson Kemper Drug.
Treasurers Report: $2326.57 currently in the Bank
Secretary's Report: John moved and Tanna seconded that the minutes be accepted as written. The
motion passed.
Old Business:
Downtown Task Force met and groups were asked to come up with their visions for the future
of the area around the downtown. Staff is currently compiling those visions and the group will meet
again after Memorial Day.
Main Street Parking Plaza: Signage will be improved directing people to the available downtown
parking areas. Signs will be bright blue. Power will need to be turned off for 2 hours to move the
electrical that is currently running to the power pole that will be coming down. Annie asked for a time
preference for shutting off electricity. The discussion was that 5 to 7AM would be the best time -but
make sure to talk to Diamond City about how that will affect them. All the trees will have electricity
available for holiday lights. There will be stone slabs like in Rivers Edge Commons Park for sitting on the
Main Street side of the parking plaza. The Final Plan for the Plaza has a monument sign and a Business
Kiosk Sign. There is not funding at this time for those elements. There was discussion of access and
egress from the parking plaza once the alley entrance is closed. Concern was expressed about getting
out of the lot at busy times. Vehicles parked in parking spots adjacent to the entry/exit often obscure
vision of oncoming traffic.
Park and Rec Update: The first Rivers Edge Commons Park concert will be the Brat Pack on
Thursday June 7th at 7PM. The first farmers market downtown will be on June 28th. 20 Vendors have
already signed up to participate. Plan is to limit vendors to the number that fit in the HRA parking area.
August 7th is the neighborhood "Night to Unite." Stephanie Asked if we would be interested in having a
party in the park that night. The police would participate and it would be open to the public. There will
be a planning meeting on May 17th at 11AM at the Elk River Police Station to plan the events throughout
the city that night.. Tamara volunteered to attend the meeting and come back with a plan for downtown.
The Falt Elk River Activity Guide is getting ready to be printed. Downtown RiversEdge events will be
included in the guide.
Website, Facebook and Branding: The Elk River Cable Channel has been interviewing people
throughout the City on the Powered by Nature Branding and why they are in Elk River and love to live
and/or work in Elk River. They wanted to know if downtown businesses-would be interested in doing
testimonials. The testimonials are being put on the Branding Blog and Facebook sites. The discussion
was definitely in favor of them coming downtown. They will be using a big camera with big cables to do
the filming downtown. Our facebook page is updated a couple of times a week. We need to have it be a
more dynamic active page. Jennifer said she would spearhead a group to strengthen the facebook page
and social media presence of the downtown. Tamara and Wendy agreed to work on this with her.
ArtSoup is coming downtown June 16th. There will be performances in the park from 10:30AM
to 8:30PM. Downtown Restaurants will be serving outside. There will be artists booths in the street. This
is a great way to get people downtown! The Arts Alliance needs our support so that they can continue to
hold this event. John Stander said that packets should have gone out to all of the downtown businesses
outlining advertising opportunities. All businesses are strongly encouraged to place an ad in the program
that will be given out in businesses the week before the event and at the event. The Arts Alliance will be
going to the EDA to request $2000 to help defray the cost of this event. The EDA will need information
from the Arts Alliance on how businesses downtown are positively affected by this event. Wendy said
that it definitely increased store traffic that day and the other businesses that she talked to were happy
with their business that day. More information about this community art festival can be found at
http://www.elkriverart.org
Planters: If you would like a matching city planter in front of your business, they would have to
be purchased. The priceis approx. $300 each. Please let Wendy know if you have a planter in front of
your business that you would like planted. You pay $20.00 and agree to water it. If you are planning on
planting it yourself that is fine. Our goal is to have all of the pots planted by Memorial Day.
Elk River 4th of July Fireworks Celebration. Tanna and Fred are on the Elk River Fireworks
committee. They requested permission from RiversEdge to use our tax exempt number to collect funds
for the celebration. Their goal is to raise $25,000. We would open a separate account at First National
Bank for this purposed to make sure that the funds didn't get comingled in our treasury. Tanna made a
motion to open an account at First National Bank for the purpose of collecting funds for the 2012, 4th of
July Fireworks Celebration. Marcy seconded the motion. The voice vote was unanimously in favor of the
motion. A spaghetti supper to raise money for the event is being held on Saturday May 19th at the Elk
River Legion from 4 to 8pm. Tickets are available at 1St National Bank Downtown and Elk Park, at the Star
News Office. More information is available at http•//www.elkriver4th.com/
Halloween: Last month we had discussed what time on Friday October 26th to hold the event.
After discussion, it was decided to offer treats from 11AM to 6PM. Businesses not wanting to offer
candy that late can take the "welcome trick or treaters" sign out of their window when they want to
stop.
Santa Downtown Dec 15, 2012 noon to 3PM. We discussed having the animals back again this
year. It was decided that that would be a good thing to do. Wendy will call Hemkers to reserve the date.
New Business:
Sidewalk Sale: Sidewalk sale will be held downtown on June 15th and 16th to take advantage of
the people downtown for ArtSoup. Wendy will put up a sign on the side of Kemper Drug and will take
out an ad in the garage sale section of the paper for the event. Participating Businesses are encouraged
to buy an ad in the ArtSoup program. The sidewalks in front of businesses will be available for sidewalk
sales. The ArtSoup Booths will be on Main street and on Jackson Ave.
Art Crawl: Will be on the 3`d Thursday in October: October 18thThe Zydeco Band will again be
performing downtown. This is a collaboration between the Arts Alliance and the RiversEdge business
association.
Pumpkin Roll: Tanna has again agreed to tray and secure pumpkins for us. It was a very fun
event. Date is to be decided.
Christmas Tree Lighting: with the high cost of an artificial tree, we decided last year to buy a live
16 foot tree each year. We need to come up with a budget for lights, decorations and a sturdy stand
that we can reuse. We can then submit the budget to civic organizations to see if a group would like
naming rights to the Tree lighting ceremony. We volunteered Neil to produce the budget since he is our
treasurer.
Paint the Town Purple Event: Elk River Relay for Life is being held at the Elk River High School
Track on August 10`h and 11`h, 2012. Elk River Travel would like us to join them in their Journey of
Hope' team in Painting the Town purple on Thursday June 21. With the continued success of Thursday
night concerts, it will be a great way to get the word out about this worthy event. There will be Relay
for Life teams in town selling products and decorating luminaries to raise money for.their teams. Team
Tescom will be doing crazy hair for kids. Elk River Travel has contacted the Star News about covering the
event and perhaps having a prize for best decorated store front. Let Marcy, Jan or Tricia at Elk River
Travel know if you will be decorating your business that night. 763-441-6830.
Granite Shores: Grand Opening Ceremony on May 14`h. They closed on the building last
Monday. The granite is being moved in this week and 5 crews are working on the site to get it ready to
rent. There is lots of interest in the Residential Units. The rent is from 900 to $1600 per month. There is
a car wash in the basement. Dogs will be allowed on the first two floors. Jim said that they would be
aggressively marketing the commercial units and asked if we had suggestions of what we would like to
see go in them. A Coffee Shop, Book Store, Dry Cleaners along with Insurance and Financial Offices were
mentioned as possibilities.
The meeting was adjourned at 3:45PM