I was working with a team of people on a grant proposal recently. As we were identifying the community’s strengths, I jotted done the following in my notes: “H(untington) = creative, engaged, adaptable, open to change, …” and continued on with the list without thinking. Later in the meeting, as I reviewed my notes to make sure that we had captured all of the salient points, it struck me: I had just described my Huntington as creative, engaged, adaptable, and open to change.

How times are different: I would not have used those terms two years ago. Yet, as I pondered what I had written, those terms do describe my Huntington. They describe my friends and the people with whom I meet, work, and interact regularly. They describe how my life, relationships, and outlook on our City have changed in the last two years.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m neither delusional nor Pollyannaish.  I know that our community faces many challenges and that we would not describe everyone in this area with the terms I used. Still, the people with whom I interact frequently are creative, engaged, and positive. They are more likely to see what can be than what can’t.

Much of this new reality is a result of my involvement in Create Huntington and the Chat ‘n Chews. The Chat ‘n Chews are an incubator for ideas. They are a place where people can offer an idea, knowing that it will be treated respectfully and positively; where the ideas can be nurtured and, with perseverance and effort, result in something that make’s our community stronger and people’s lives richer.

Two recent projects, the Culture Center and CAFÉ Huntington, highlight the ingenuity of our community and the power of what is possible when we match our ideas with energy.

The Culture Center is an effort to establish a place where people from various backgrounds can celebrate their culture, food, dance, history, art and language. It seeks to express the rich diversity of Huntington. Begun just weeks ago, over 100 people have already expressed a desire to participate in the project. Organizers hope to identify a temporary home for the Center this summer and begin holding functions as early as this fall.

CAFÉ Huntington, formerly known as the “Starving Artist Foundation”, has been on a lightning-fast trajectory. The idea was hatched less than two weeks ago and has already garnered an army of support. Organizers hope to officially launch the program in early summer. The goal of the effort is to provide micro-grants to artists and creative projects. To do this, the group will hold monthly dinners, open to everyone. Artists and others may submit grant requests for art projects, community programs, and other creative endeavors. Each dinner guest will make a nominal donation to the group’s grant fund, 100% of which will be given to the artist or project voted on by the dinner guests.

These projects are not alone. To date, volunteers working on projects they care about through Create Huntington have born over 80 projects. Some, such as the effort to improve access to recycling or to establish a dog park, have made enormous progress through perseverance and patience. Others, such as Trees for Tomorrow, the West Virginia 5K Championship and the formation of the Jewell City Kickball League, shot off like rockets.

All of the projects share one thing: a spark, an idea; offered by a person and supported by a group of interested, engaged volunteers. I invite you to see Huntington through our eyes, to get involved with positive, engaged people, and to begin creating a quality of life in Huntington that will be a magnate for others. Join your friends at the Create Huntington Chat ‘n Chews, held 5:30 – 7:00 pm, every Thursday in the lobby of the Frederick Building, 940 Fourth Avenue.

• CAFÉ Huntington (formerly the Starving Artist Foundation) to provide micro-grants to artists and creative projects. The group plans to announce the date for the first dinner: www.herald-dispatch.com/news/briefs/x540213341/Starving-artist-foundation-could-be-useful-to-city
• Culture Center to create a space where people from different backgrounds can share their culture’s food, music, dance, language, history, and art with others. The group will continue working on a location for the events and announce their first fundraiser: www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=104793586232582&v=info
• Recycling. The group is looking at 2 opportunities to improve access to recycling facilities in the area:  www.herald-dispatch.com/news/x540212889/Cabell-County-pursues-recycling-program
• Downtown retail initiative. We’ve had lots of great news regarding downtown retail development: Wright’s is re-opening, Third and Ninth Deli and the Pottery Place are making progress, work is underway to announce a new center for artists and artisans, etc. Bring your ideas and energy to keep the momentum going.
• Creation of an outdoor market downtown. Check out Birmingham, AL as an example: http://www.pepperplacemarket.com/.
• Huntington Art Festival, combining programs of various arts organizations into a single summer spectacle.
• Partnership with MUCH (Marshall University Create Huntington) to create a downtown festival welcoming new MU students to town.

 Upcoming Events You May Find of Interest

Marshall Artist Series Food and Wine Festival: Uncorked      Tickets are now on sale for the Marshall Artists Series annual fundraiser Uncorked!: A food fair and wine festival, from 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday, May 22, on 4th Avenue, between 9th and 10th streets, and inside the Arcade Galleria, in downtown Huntington. Patrons are invited to shop the street food fair for organic, locally sourced, fresh market and enhance their palates with appetizers, main dishes and desserts, prepared by regional chefs, local restaurants and specialty shops. There is no charge to visit the street fair. However, vendors are cash only. Festival goers will have the opportunity to taste more than 40 wines complimented by the jazz sounds of Laura Evans & Company. Tickets to the wine festival are $35 and may be purchased the day of the event in the lobby of the Keith Albee Theater or in advance at the Marshall Artists Series box office, by phone 304-696-6656 or online at www.ticketmaster.com.

Strong Neighborhoods Action Summit            The Strong Neighborhoods Action Summit will be held on May 25th from 7- 8:45 pm at the St. Mary’s Education Center on 5th Ave and 29th St. This is the culmination of a month long series of neighborhood forums where residents identified ways to make their neighborhood safer and stronger. Join us at this city-wide meeting to share ideas and get involved.

Sustainability Training The West Virginia Sustainable Communities program (WVSC) is offering a Sustainability 101 training in Huntington on Monday, May 17, 2010 from 9:30 am to 3:30 pm. The training is being promoted and coordinated by the City of Huntington, Create Huntington, HADCO and Unlimited Future, Inc. WVSC offers this program to garner support from diverse stakeholders to create a Sustainability Team for a community. After the training, our community will be challenged to put together an active group of volunteers who will then work with WVSC to engage in more outreach activities, greenhouse gas inventory, and multiple workshops and meetings to create a Sustainability Action Plan which is suitable for Huntington. Registration is limited to 30 people and the class is full. To be placed on a wait list or for information about future training sessions send an email to createhuntington@gmail.com with your contact information.

The Chat ‘n Chew this Thursday is shaping up to be one packed with very cool projects. Here are a few of the things going on:

• Starving Artist Foundation to provide micro-grants to artists and creative projects: www.herald-dispatch.com/news/briefs/x540213341/Starving-artist-foundation-could-be-useful-to-city
• Recycling: www.herald-dispatch.com/news/x540212889/Cabell-County-pursues-recycling-program
• Culture Center to create a space where people from different backgrounds can share their culture’s food, music, dance, language, history, and art with others: www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=104793586232582&v=info
• New downtown Deli/Market – Sylvia Crickard, one of the owners of the soon-to-be-opened third & NINTH deli/market joined us last week. For info on their new store, go to: http://thirdandninth.com.
• Dog Park: www.herald-dispatch.com/news/x1031424823/Ritter-Park-dog-park-plans-approved
• Community forums on safety and security: www.herald-dispatch.com/news/x1838470256/Series-of-forums-to-promote-safe-strong-neighborhoods-prevent-crime
• Downtown retail initiative and creation of a outdoor market downtown
• Huntington Art Festival, combining programs of various arts organizations into a single summer spectacle

 Don’t forget about the Matching Micro Grant Program

To apply for a grant, or for more information, stop by the Chat ‘n Chew or go to:

http://cts.vresp.com/c/?MountainsideMedia/ee32bc93b7/83dc25424b/d5bbb10db7/MountainsideMedia/751a776beb/83dc25424b/86cfe5dc23/MountainsideMedia/b905f34ce4/83dc25424b/8bfee69360.

Highlawn is home to two small parks; one is just a little bitty patch of grass and the other, the larger of the two, is loaded with amenities like basketball courts, tennis courts, a play-set, and a bunch of nice green space. Plus, it’s right along the river so it attracts picnickers and fishermen. It’s a great little park.

The problem with the park is that it attracts so many people that their isn’t enough parking space and the little street that borders it is too narrow for parking on the street. Sadly, people insist on parking on the street and, at times, in the grass of the park as well. We have plenty of other little roads leading into the park people can park on but, sometimes, people just park willy-nilly.

Well, to those of us who live near the park it’s sad to see because the cars end up damaging the green space that kids play in. Today, that is all changing though. A group of concerned citizens banded together to help beautify the park while protecting it from vehicle encroachment. They raised some money and bought a collection of plants; including a pink and a white dogwood trees, and today they started the installation.

So far they’ve just installed the two dogwoods and the beginning of a nice barricade to help protect the garden. Next they will be removing weeds, improving the grass, and installing some rose bushes. It’s going to be a beautiful crown on our park.

There will be some very special guests at the Create Huntington Chat ‘n Chew this Thursday, April 8^th. We will host a conversation with a group of college students and faculty from Malmö University in Malmö, Sweden. They are in Huntington studying our efforts to revitalize the community and to establish a new economy that is competitive in the 21^st Century.

What is important for us is that Malmö is a de-industrialized city much like Huntington. Their story mirrors ours. They face the same economic and social problems we face, and have invested in their community and launched programs that are transforming their community.

A waterfront town, Malmö sits on the Sound of Copenhagen in southern Sweden. As with Huntington, the industrial age was kind to Malmö. The City’s population was 100,000 in 1915, swelled to 200,000 by 1952 and to more than 250,000 two decades later. However, the global recession that struck in the 1970’s hit Malmö’s industrial sector especially hard, forcing layoffs in the shipyards and with manufacturers. The City’s largest employer, the Kockums shipyard, shut its doors in the mid 1980’s, devastating the economy and the community’s perception of itself. Malmö was de-populated as people moved away to find employment. Many of the middle class families who stayed moved to the suburbs and surrounding towns. The community continued to struggle in the early 1990’s, losing about 27,000 jobs.

However, after 40 years of economic decline Malmö began to reinvent itself in the late 1990’s. They redeveloped the now abandoned industrial waterfront into apartments, villas and a commercial center. They invested heavily in infrastructure and education. Malmö University, located on the waterfront, was established in 1998 and is now the eighth largest university in Sweden. And they are encouraging the growth of the creative economy, based on researchers, scientists, artists, writers, and others.

While their community still faces significant challenges, they are attracting residents downtown, building a 21^st Century economy, and becoming an attractive place for people from across Europe to live and work. We invite you to learn about the challenges Malmö faces, the steps they are taking to rebuild a world-class City, and consider how we can build on their experiences to revitalize Huntington.

Of course we also will host conversations and teams working on a number of projects, including: creating a multicultural center; encouraging downtown retail development; expanding recycling options; holding community forums on safety and security; creating an outdoor market downtown; establishing topical reading groups; and much more.

To participate in any of these discussions and get involved in transforming your community, join your friends and neighbors at the Create Huntington Chat ‘n Chew, held 5:30 – 7:00 pm, every Thursday, in the lobby of the Frederick Building, 940 Fourth Avenue. For more information, go to www.createhuntington.com.

Huntington, take a bow. In a little over one month you came together as few other communities could and participated in a grand effort to invite Google to launch a new ultra-high speed network in the area. The Google Fiber project has the ability to transform our area with internet connection speeds 10 times faster than anything normally available.

Of course, we have no idea if they will select Huntington as a demonstration site. Over 1100 communities applied for the opportunity in a very competitive process. We are competing against major metropolitan areas such as Seattle and Baltimore, cities like Detroit that have been devastated by the recession, and communities throughout our region including Charleston, Morgantown, Gallipolis and Lexington.

While we won’t know if we have been selected for some time, we can say with confidence that the Google Fiber project has already begun to change Huntington. It demonstrated that we are eager to claim a driver’s seat in the 21st century economy. It showed that our community is capable of uniting behind a bold vision and marshalling a small army of everyday people to help make that vision real.

Marshall University, the City of Huntington, Strictly Business Computer Systems, Create Huntington, the Cabell County Board of Education and many others joined forces to submit the community’s application. The group’s strategy was to support the technical information and justification in the official application with an overwhelming amount of community support. To do this, they reached out through the media, websites, Facebook, Twitter, Google apps, and personal pleas.

Your response exceeded everyone’s expectations and demonstrated your hopes, vision and eagerness to jump into the new economy. Most importantly it showed how much you care about your community. Here are a few points to consider:

During the last week of proposal period, Huntington was highest ranked city to appear in Google’s search results; higher than major metropolitan areas such as Baltimore and Seattle.

Over 1,600 people became Facebook friends of the Google Fiber in Huntington WV page, with many submitting comments and support.

More than 40 people posted YouTube videos encouraging Google to select Huntington, including Mayor Wolfe, President Kopp, visiting classical pianist Alexander Tutunov, Marshall’s Up Late crew, and many regular residents.

Many local residents supported the City’s official nomination by personally nominating Huntington for consideration.

Marshall University accelerated existing plans and partnered with Google to migrate over 50,000 accounts to Google apps in under 100 hours, a task that normally takes six weeks.

Will this work? Will we be selected by Google as a demonstration site? Who knows.

We can be certain that the community has already used the Google Fiber project to bring people and groups together, and to change Huntington for the better.

We invite you to maintain this energy and momentum, and to express your vision for what we can all do to make Huntington a great place to live and work. Join your neighbors at the Create Huntington Chat ‘n Chew, held 5:30 – 7:00 every Thursday in the lobby of the Frederick Building 940 Fourth Avenue. If you’re unable to attend a Chat ‘n Chew, you can find additional information and get involved at www.createhuntington.com.

He will explore how theater can help examine the values that bring American’s together and keep us apart; and open a dialogue so that we may address some of society’s most difficult problems.

The sessions are free and open to the public. Please feel free to share this with others.

Michael Rohd is the author of Theatre for Community, Conflict & Dialogue; the Hope is Vital Training Manual, and the founder of Hope is Vital, the nationally recognized theatre and community dialogue/outreach organization.

Friday, April 2, 7:30 pm Presentation by Michael Rohd Francis-Booth Experimental Theatre Reception to follow, Joan C. Edwards Playhouse Lobby

Saturday, April 3 9:30 am • Registration and coffee Francis-Booth Experimental Theatre 10:00 am • Workshop with local area attendees

In that first meeting with Jan Fox, Allen Taylor, and Brandi Jacob Jones I discovered that not only were the city and the University going to start working on this but that it was a real priority for them however, due to their official positions, and their current workloads, that they wouldn’t be able to work on getting the community involved. I knew that we had a great community (thanks to my exposure to Create Huntington) so I decided that my main contribution could be to spearhead the community’s response to Google and that day I setup a website and began talking to other people who were interested in getting involved.

Right off the bat John Cummings (an employee at Marshall) bought a domain name for the website and setup the needed configuration to make it work (http://googlefiberhuntington.com). Julie Hewett, a resident of Barboursville, suggested I setup a facebook fan page. Then Adam Litton, a recent Purdue Graduate, offered to restructure the website and populate it with interesting and compelling content.

Over the course of the next week we all worked on spreading the word and before I knew it we had 500 members of our fan page; WV public Radio was interviewing us, and WSAZ was scheduling a shoot to cover the story as well. By the time we had the second meeting with city and university officials the roster of people invovled had grown to include Kit Anderson (with the city) and Jeremy Baisden (with the Cabell County Board of Education) as well as all John and Adam.

That meeting was great. We came up with a bunch of good ideas to get the word out to the community and Marshall was providing some great information to the city to help them complete their 19 page application. Kit and Brandi were both heading out of town (Brandi to DC and Kit to training) and during that week, in their spare time, they kept on plugging on the city’s application as well as spreading the word. Brandi and Mayor Wolfe had some great discussions with our senators and congressmen and came back more fired up than ever about the Google Fiber project.

At about this time I started putting some videos up on YouTube (http://youtube.com/fiberHTG) starting with a six second and nine second pair of simple joke clips just to illustrate how easy it was for everyone to make a video. Later that week I also spent an evening at Starbucks in Pullman square getting people to record their message to Google on my laptop. Without the assistance of Gilbert Smith I wouldn’t have reached nearly as many people; but, before I knew it, 40 people had recorded their messages and WSAZ had completed recording a story about the project that aired later that night.

Meanwhile, in the background, the Marshall arts department was getting involved thanks to Brent Patterson who was making some silly and creative videos to put on our youtube channel. At the same time Byron Durham of Mountainside Media was storyboarding and planning out a more advanced video staring Casey Williams.

At the same time Marshall U. was accelerating their plans to migrate to Google Apps and, thanks to the efforts of Edward Aractingi and his team of six people, we were able to speak directly with people at Google involved with the Google Fiber project.

Jeremy Baisden and Superintendent Smith at Cabell County schools were also working hard to make this all a reality. Mr. Smith was getting flyers (via Adam Litton) sent out to every family in the county and he was coordinating a last second call by Jed Flowers. Jeremy was digging through voluminous tomes of stats to help the city complete their application while our city officials were also working on the city’s annual budget.

I was busy capturing screen shots in Google Street view to make a stop motion animated video tour of our city while another Marshall employee, Eric Himes, and his team were slicing and splicing videos together to make our citizen collage.

By the way, at this point we were at over 1300 fans on our facebook page – fans like Sara Campbell who were nominating the city, spreading the word via their facebook and twitter statuses, and helping get others involved.

This past week the Mayor made his own great video starring his horse Red, our senators, congressmen, and Governor all made videos and our city leaders held a press conference helping explain the value of Google Fiber to our community.

Honestly, this has been an amazing experience for me. I’ve gotten to see people from a wide variety of backgrounds and current positions come together to work toward the common goal of convincing Google to come to Huntington; almost all in their spare time while also still putting in 40+ hour work weeks at their jobs. Heck, we even had plenty of people who aren’t from around here such as the master pianist Alexander Tutunov (video) helping us out!

To every single person who helped, who tweeted, who used facebook, who nominated, and who made a video please accept my deepest feeling of gratitude. You have all made my life richer for the experience.

On a recent business trip I found myself with plenty of time on a plane. I used the air-time to catch up on a book I’d been intending to read for months. That book, both a simple story and complex allegory, held me in check until I finished it and, in many ways, hasn’t let go yet. The book is The Art of Racing in the Rain, by Garth Stein.

The story chronicles the life of a middle-class Seattle family through the eyes of their dog, Enzo. Denny, Enzo’s master, is a semi-professional race car driver, whose outlook on life comes from racing and observing drivers. In explaining both his driving style and his philosophy on life, Denny quotes Gabriel Flouret, a French Formula One driver, “That which you manifest is before you.”

Through Enzo’s eyes, Stein offers a powerful truth of life that we should all consider and can use to all our benefit. Enzo explains, “Such a simple concept, yet so true: that which we manifest is before us; we are the creators of our own destiny. Be it through intention or ignorance, our successes and our failures have been brought on by none other than ourselves.”

His point is, I believe, that we have the responsibility for our lives – and for the purposes of this column – our community. We do not have to trust our community’s fate to the winds of chance. We have the ability to guide it to a bright, or not-so-bright, future.

That which you manifest is before you. Many of your friends and neighbors see a bright future for Huntington and are working to make their vision become real. They see a lively, safe, friendly community with restaurants, shops, parks, and jobs, and working hard to manifest that reality. Some of the projects people and groups are working on now include:

• Encouraging Google to install a high-speed network in the area

• Establishing a multi-cultural center where people from all backgrounds can celebrate and share their heritage 

• Expanding recycling options for local residents

• Creating an open-air market downtown

• Increasing the number of retail and service businesses downtown and providing retail opportunities for entrepreneurs and artisans

• Establishing community reading forums to bring people together to read and talk about novels, short stores, poetry, nonfiction and movies

• Creating new venues for visual and performing artists

• Beautifying the community by maintaining flower gardens in public parks and spaces, and by expanding the number of community gardens throughout the area

• Addressing deep-rooted problems, such as crime, poverty, litter and graffiti

You are invited to join us. You are invited to see a bright future, join positive and engaged people, and be part of making it happen. You may stop by a Create Huntington Chat ‘n Chew, held every 5:30 – 7:00 pm, every Thursday in the lobby of the Frederick Building. If you are unable to join us on Thursdays, you may email createhuntington@gmail.com or go to www.createhuntington.com to learn about the many projects going on now, submit ideas, and volunteer to assist.

Today’s column is going to begin with a little reader interaction. To do this, I’ll need you to put down your coffee. Now, raise your hand if you have complained that the leaders in the 60’s and 70’s let the Interstate bypass downtown Huntington. I imagine there are lots of hands raised and many of you saying how much better our City would be if we just had high speed access to downtown.

Now, raise your hand if you’ve complained about Charleston’s refusal to consider building a regional airport. Again, I’m betting there are lots of hands waiving now. I’ll bet many are saying, “Wouldn’t it have made a difference if we just had great access to the rest of the world?”

Enough “what ifs”! We have another opportunity to provide fast, easy access to the area; and this time we have a chance to have better access than almost anyone else in the country. Create Huntington, Strictly Business, Marshall University and the City of Huntington are collaborating on an exciting project and need your help to make it a success. Later this year, Google plans to select one or more communities to test an ultra-high speed broadband network that could provide Internet speeds 100 times faster than what most Americans have access to today.

What could this mean for the area? No one really knows. In the 1950’s and 1960’s, I’m sure no one knew how critical the Interstate would be to local economies. We do know that our children and their children will be impacted by our efforts. Ultra high-speed bandwidth will almost certainly drive more innovation: in high-definition video, remote data storage, real-time multimedia collaboration, and provide unimagined opportunities for software developers, researchers, writers and innovators. It will give us an opportunity to compete and win in the 21^st Century economy.

You can help make this happen. In fact, it won’t happen without you. Part of Google’s evaluation of the communities will include an assessment of how badly residents want the super-fast service.

The deadline for you to submit information is Thursday, March 25^th. To do this, you can get details and nominate Huntington at: http://sites.google.com/site/huntingtonwvfiber/ or the Facebook fan page, “Google Fiber for Huntington WV.” We encourage you to be creative: offer a written explanation, post a YouTube video, record a song, or upload some art. Use whatever creativity and skills you have to convince Google that they should select this area.

There are a number of people who would be happy to help you if you have questions or are not comfortable doing this yourself. To learn more, you can:

• Email why@whyhuntington.com with questions,
• Post questions on the Google Fiber for Huntington WV Facebook page, or
• Go to the Pullman Square Starbucks anytime from 5:30 – 9:00 pm this Thursday, March 18^th. We will have volunteers available to help you fill-out on-line forms, record videos, and answer questions.

To learn more about this project, or about how you can make your vision for a better Huntington a reality, join us at a Create Huntington Chat ‘n Chew, held 5:30 – 7:00 pm every Thursday in the lobby of the Frederick Building, 940 Fourth Avenue. For more information, go to www.createhuntington.com.