Thanks to all of you
First of all we want to thank all of you for joining the mailing list and express our gratitude to those who have generously contributed to the Red Mountain Park Fund. In a very short time we have gotten the ball rolling and caused a small stir in the city. We have over 300 subscribers to our newsletter and our link to the Red Mountain Park Fund has generated over $4000 in public contributions. This shows the value of word-of-mouth communication among folks like yourselves. Because of this groundswell, we have garnered a seat on the Red Mountain Park Steering Committee. This is a great first step toward our two main goals: helping insure that Red Mountain Park becomes a reality and having a voice in what that park becomes.
Where we're heading
As most of you know, U. S. Steel has pledged the Park lands conditionally—$7 million dollars must be raised by January 2007. A steering committee of 15 members has been assembled by the Black Warrior - Cahaba Rivers Land Trust to oversee the fundraising campaign. They have engaged a consulting firm to pursue federal, state and local grants as well as other funding opportunities. They expect about 80% of this $7 million to come from these sources and hope to raise the remainder from the private sector.
The Steering Committee is now conducting a national search for a landscape design firm to prepare a master plan for the park, hoping to have a selection in place by November 1st. Once that firm has been selected, they will be soliciting input from the committee, from Friends, and from the public at large about what the park makeup will be (you can view an initial conceptual plan PDF on our site). How and when these forums would be conducted is not yet known but it should be our responsibility to make sure all interested segments of the general public are represented and that we demonstrate evidence of support for the facilities we propose.
To these purposes
To help coalesce our objectives, we will be adding an open forums section to this site and hope to have a couple of informal gatherings of the Friends group, either around social events or perhaps a fundraising sporting event. We believe it will be important to present a fairly unified and representative voice to government leaders and members of the Steering Committee. We want to show them that we have done our homework, that our desires match those of the community at large and that we are onboard for the long haul.
Some of you may have seen mention of our organization in The Birmingham News' cover story on Red Mountain Park in July. The Park was also the subject of a recent morning segment on Fox 6 where Wendy Jackson of the Land Trust, Bobby Humprey, Alabama All-American and Friends member and I were able to talk a bit about the Friends group. We hope to continue getting coverage to increase our own numbers. The more emails we have on the Friends list, the more voices we can add to our forums and meetings in the future, and the better we can argue that we represent the people of Birmingham.
We are courting designers to help us with a Red Mountain Park logo, to come up with t-shirts, bumper stickers and a poster campaign. We will continue to seek outlets in the press and local TV and are excited that Wendy and Bobby are committed to helping us raise awareness. Mostly we are depending on our own organization to keep spreading the word, to email the site to friends, to mention it to their riding, running, walking, drinking, singing, dancing, whatever buddies.
Contributions to the Park fund are also an important way to demonstrate our seriousness. Beyond the initial $7 million necessary to purchase the Park lands, an estimated $30 - $40 million will be needed for the Park's construction. Therefore it will be critical for our group to continue its growth and advocacy so that once Red Mountain Park is secured, funding sources, both public and private will continually be reminded what a win-win situation this will be for local communities, the city as a whole and the reputation of our state.
Next Steps
Now that we have an established subscriber base, we will try to get a newsletter out each month to keep everyone up to date on developments. We also want to open the organization up so that all of you who have contributed ideas can better share them with the group. The site forums and a couple of socials should help with that. Opening up our design search to a member vote will be another method. Also, I encourage you to email me directly if you have any questions about the group. There is no hierarchy here, we are all equal partners working toward a single purpose.
Thanks for subscribing,
John Cobbs
Friends of Red Mountain Park