On the web
People looking to get involved can reach out through the North Daviess Community Growth Alliance Facebook page.
A new business organization is looking to create more opportunities in northern Daviess County. The North Daviess Community Growth Alliance is the successor the the Odon Business Alliance with a design on developing and participating in community events throughout the northern part of the county.
Richard Saladin is the president of the new organization.
“We wanted to incorporate all of the towns in the northern part of the county and not just be Odon-centric,” he said. “That way we can help the businesses that are here and try to bring in more business. We want to be a resource for all of these communities, like Plainville, Epsom and Elnora and not just Odon.”
The North Daviess Alliance is slowly forming its identity. While they began putting the pieces together, they picked up some of the projects the Odon Business Alliance handled while developing ideas for projects in the future.
“We’ve been kind of slowrolling a lot of this as we as a board hone in on what our focus will be and our mission will be,” said Saladin. “Meanwhile we are working on the things from the past. We are getting ready for the Pumpkin Festival, but we are renaming it the Harvest Festival. We are planning that right now.”
Currently the bulk of the members of the new organization either are in Odon or have ties to the Odon business community. Saladin says the new organization will be looking to recruit new members in the other northern Daviess County communities.
“We didn’t launch a membership package this year because we didn’t feel like we had any thing to offer. We don’t have it lined out,” he said. “We are still trying to help in little ways. We are working on a membership package that we will roll out this fall. At that point is when we will get out into those other communities and bring other people into the mix. At that point, when we get that established, we will sit down with the other communities and look at ways we can help them.”
Saladin says that he expects the organization to become more aggressive when it gets past the formation state. In the meantime, they are working with Indiana University on laying plans for the future.
“We are working with the IU Office for Rural Development. They have student projects with rural communities. For us they are working on a website design,” said Saladin. “That is great for us. It gets them some great experience and it helps us because we are not website people. It’s a great program and we are happy to be a part of that.”
One good thing about the project is that it includes a participant from Washington. Estaban Becerra, who went to IU as a Welles Scholar is part of the team working on the North Daviess Alliance.
“I understand that this year IU decided to concentrate on just a handful of counties, and Daviess County is one of those,” said Saladin. ”I really think it is great that we have someone from Daviess County involved in this. Daviess County is a different kind of place. It has a lot of big things happening. We have a lot of small communities, and I think it is great to have students who have a connection here.”
The IU project is expected to end in August.
“I feel good about the progress we have made as an organization this year,” said Saladin. ”We picked up a good foundation. A lot of this is new to the board members. We want to get it right. We want to be the ones to make an impact, so the businesses can see the value in what we are trying to do. I think we are making good progress.”
The organization is always looking for volunteers and with the Harvest Festival coming up, will need them.
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