[Summit] North Main Street Project

Thu Aug 20 18:49:43 UTC 2009

Hi Andrew

I'm just wondering - have you ever attended a N. Main St. sub-committee meeting or a Summit Neighborhood Association meeting? It sounds like you are very passionate about the N. Main St. project and could offer some ideas to the committee. If you'd like to attend a N. Main St. sub-committee meeting I'm sure any of the present committee members could inform you of the next time, date and location of the meeting.

As I have stated before on the SNA email list - the only way to bring about change is to be active, present and engaged.
Thanks,
Melissa

Date: Thu, 20 Aug 2009 14:29:52 -0400
From: gerritt at mindspring.com
To: writerkeating at yahoo.com; summit at sna.providence.ri.us
Subject: Re: [Summit] North Main Street Project

Re: [Summit] North Main Street Project

We have a base line of data collected on parcels and ownership on NMS, have actively engaged many community members, business owners, and governmental officials in discussing the possibilities, and have helped set a tone so that owners know the community is interested in what happens. As you said, you have no idea how far $30K goes and no idea how to productively spend it.  Come join the committee.  Greg gerritt

on 8/20/09 1:16 PM, Andrew Keating at writerkeating at yahoo.com wrote:

Mr. Gerritt makes some interesting points here but I fail to see what exactly has come from the $30K that has been spent or invested into the project. I understand that the value of informational "bricks and mortar" is nice, but claiming that short-term expectations is unrealistic seems quite erroneous when preceding a statement that you are hoping that some millionaire with a few bucks lying around is going to invest in a region that has shown minimal improvement in three decades.  The point that I am making is that talk is cheap.  I've seen actual projects that cost less than $30K to complete, and while it may not be much, or the projects may be somewhat minimal in comparison to what needs to be done to North Main Street as a whole, doesn't it seem that if 30 years and $30,000 has brought us nothing more than an opinion that "North Main Street needs work", that sitting around and talking about it is NOT doing "everything we can think of".  Now I am not a community development planner, and I don't know exactly where I would start; but I do have enough business knowledge to know that $30,000 could easily go to some realistic action.  Much more realistic than hoping someone with a few million dollars will come along as our saving grace.

Again, I'm not trying to throw around accusations. I'm simply wondering why the money is going to talk and no action.  What debilitating factor came about that forced the NMS Committee to say that the only hope is to wait for more money, rather than saying that the money they have could easily go to real progress?

Message: 2

Date: Wed, 12 Aug 2009 13:53:08 -0400

From: Greg Gerritt <gerritt at mindspring.com <http://us.mc583.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=gerritt@mindspring.com> >

Subject: Re: [Summit] North Main Street Project

To: Summit Neighborhood <summit at sna.providence.ri.us <http://us.mc583.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=summit@sna.providence.ri.us> >

Message-ID: <C6A879C4.3B47E%gerritt at mindspring.com <http://us.mc583.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=gerritt@mindspring.com> >

Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

Mr Keating is asking for things that 30 years of effort by the community and

our various levels of government have been unable to deliver.  The North

Main St committee is attempting to leverage a very small amount of money (it

will take millions to actually change N Main St).  $30,000 as an investment

in bricks and mortar gets you nothing.  $30K invested in information and

conversation creates the possibility that someone with millions might invest

it in NMS as opposed to investing it in Cranston or Seekonk.  With no

investment in information and conversation, nothing will happen.  With the

investment, maybe something will happen, but as it took 30 years for NMS to

sink to where it is, to expect instant results  is totally unrealistic.

Unless Mr Keating has some idea of what miracles he could perform with $30K

that he wishes to share with all of us, I hope he will join the NMS commitee

and work with us on the long slow slog of revitalization.  We do not know

what will happen, all we know is that trying everything we can think of is

better than not trying.  Greg gerritt  member NMS committee

on 8/12/09 12:13 PM, Andrew Keating at writerkeating at yahoo.com <http://us.mc583.mail.yahoo.com/mc/compose?to=writerkeating@yahoo.com>  wrote:

> Greetings,  Concerned citizen here.  While it was somewhat difficult for me to

> be able to attend the most recent meeting, I understand that the topic of the

> North Main Street projects was an issue raised.  I reflect on Mr. Tanalski?s

> email which had been issued on July 10th.  He raises some very interesting

> points regarding the general discomfort that it seems many hold toward the

> wasteful spending that the organization has already set forth, which has

> reaped no reward.  It is true that TAR hill has been a terrible sight for some

> time now.  I remember as a child playing on the tennis and basketball courts

> there, and it bothers me to walk past them now to see them in such poor

> condition.  The North Main Street project had $10,000 with which to work some

> time ago, and I cannot name one item which has had significant improvement,

> except perhaps a new Walgreens; but I hardly believe that was the work of SNA

> or the North Main Street crew.  I would be very interested in knowing what the

> specific outcome of the initial $10,000 allocated to this project was, and

> furthermore, what are the expected usages of additional funds (or where they

> might be coming from exactly).  It seems that SNA has discussed the notion of

> doing something about North Main Street, and the organization has the purpose

> set forth to better our community, but this crux of our neighborhood has been

> in despair for many years ? I think it about time we do something about it.

> Enough with the studies, as Mr. Tanalski referenced, it is time for real

> action with real results.  I look forward to some notes as to what exactly is

> expected of the future of North Main Street.  Best wishes,  Andrew Keating

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