MARCH MEETING OF HHA

HELDERBERG HILLTOWNS ASSOCIATION

Report of March meeting - 03/07/11. Called to order 7:10 p.m. by Zenie at Helderberg Lutheran Church (formerly St. Paul’s) in Berne. Many thanks to Jack Milner, our host, for shoveling the walkway and providing a tour of this beautiful old building. Present: Zenie Gladieux, John Elberfeld, Jane McLean, Jack Milner, Anna Wolfe, Amy Pokorny

COMMUNICATIONS:

• Randy Grippin has a scheduling conflict, but wanted to advise us that the Berne Town Park may be available for weekly farmer markets; he has been speaking with Berne Supervisor George Gebe.
• Cheryl Frantzen: The Second Annual Knox Conservation Council Fall Festival will be on October 8th, Columbus Day weekend, during the Albany County Firemen’s Muster being hosted by the Knox Fire Department.
• Bonnie Kohl emailed that she won’t be able to do the squash wholesale growing project this year; the government requires a stiff fee for permits which she can’t absorb. Tom Gallagher, Cooperative Extension farm rep, won’t be able to assist her this year as his coverage has been extended to 9 counties due to budget cuts. She reported that the farmers who participated in the project last year did well.

WEBSITE: John has continued to work a bit on the site, but there has not been much activity. He will contact people who are on the site to discuss their web page. We discussed how we can continue to contact people to add to the site? We can seek articles in the Altamont Enterprise, the Greenville Pioneer, the Albany Times Union, and the Schenectady Gazette about the website after we polish it and make decisions about community calendar. Amy will send to John her spreadsheet with the names of local small businesses to be contacted. We can use community contacts to do a direct mailing to local organizations: a one page flyer describing our group and explaining how to use the information on our website to better publicize their own efforts.

COMMUNITY CALENDAR: We spent some time discussing the needs of a community calendar. John was asked if we could have links to community calendars of local papers? (Probably not). Can we set up a simple way for organizations to submit their information, such as a spreadsheet? (Possible, but our website format MediaWiki doesn’t automatically sort entries by date, which would make it impossible to group entries by date.) Mediawiki would allow entries to be set up by categories [ex. church, recreation] but not by date within categories. Date sorts would be by entry date and not by event date. To be useful the calendar must allow entry by the public, tie events to the correct dates and allow events to be grouped by date and possibly by category. John will check Hal Miller’s website to see how events are entered there and will check freeware sources for possible community calendars. (N.B. A sample calendar is being tested on the website as of 3/11; please check it out - Zenie)

COMMUNITY OUTREACH: We need to develop an “elevator speech” presentation about our group and ask to present it at the Town Board meetings in all four towns soon. Berne and Knox Historical societies already have historical drive-yourself tours which could be made available to the public quickly. Do Rensselaerville and Westerlo have something similar that we could use?

COMMITTEE FOR ACTIVITIES: The remainder of the meeting was devoted to discussion of the Proposed Areas of Interest [from last meeting]: which do we need and what should the responsibilities for each be? We decided that each area will be a committee; we will need a Chair and volunteers to work on each committee; the Chair of each committee will be a member of the Steering Committee. The Proposed Areas of Interest list from last meeting was evaluated for relevance and efficiencies. Some of the items on the original list have already been completed or are in process; these have been flagged as follows:

1. = things we’ve accomplished;

• • = activity in process. Top priority items have been tagged. Volunteers will be sought to populate these committees; please call or email Zenie with your interest.

HILLTOWNS COMMUNITY SUPPORT: Chair Dawn Jordan, John Elberfeld, Zenie Gladieux

1. Create website,

• • Create Hilltowns community calendar,

Develop a publicity kit for HHA,

• • develop a web page for each local business, with a link to any existing website

Help businesses develop own websites

Develop an “elevator speech” presentation to be put on disk,

1) Present ourselves to the town boards to urge cooperation in promoting and supporting Hilltowns activities

2) Develop and promote a ”buy local” campaign to the Hilltowns

AGRICULTURAL: Chair Amy Pokorny

1. Farmers’ Market at Octagon Barn,

• • October Harvest Festivals in Knox and Medusa,

Help promote Heldeberg Market,

Reestablish a wholesale growing project (now inactive),

1)

• • Develop a Farmers’ Market at the Berne Town Park

Explore establishing a community cannery,

Explore offering classes on home canning and freezing (in cooperation with Coop Extension?) Organize classes in farm activities (free help for farmers?)

2) Organize classes on designing home vegetable gardens

HOSPITALITY: Anna Wolfe

1) Identify public restrooms in the Hilltowns, put them on our maps & website

2) Identify lodgings, put on maps & website

Promote availability of weddings/family reunions/ business picnic catering by local businesses

Tie tours and events to existing local services and activities

Promote use of local products in restaurants

TOURISM: Zenie Gladieux

• • Develop maps and documentation for drive-yourself tours

Develop farm tours, perhaps by topics of interest, i.e. sheep-shearing .

1) Organize town-wide garage sales for each town

2) Organize open house studio/antique shop toursIdentify and publicize one or more “scenic byways”

Work with towns to set up visitor centers for maps and brochures

Organize weekly thematic tours during summer months: baby animals, alternative energy, fiber arts, fall foliage, maple products, pumpkins, Xmas trees, etc.

Improve local signage for businesses

Develop interface with Albany County Visitors Bureau

RECREATION: Gerry Chartier, Dan Driscoll, Jack Milner, Chad Jemison

• • Promote the Long Path and develop links with it from other areas

1) Develop a series of seasonal hikes

2) Develop ATV/snowmobile link on website

Arrange classes for hunting or fishing with other organizations

HISTORICAL/LIBRARIES: John Elberfeld, Jane McLean

1. Genealogy Days in September and October 2010,

1. Establish a link to Hal Miller’s website

1) Organize training class with experts for historical societies and libraries

2) Genealogy class for public

3) Organize school programs with historical societies: going into school with “suitcase” of information; (Helen L, Mary K, Carol W?)

Build an inventory of old homes in each town

CULTURAL/EDUCATIONAL: Amy Pokorny

1. Hilltown Players, contradances in Rensselaerville

• • Contradances at Octagon Barn [Paul Rosenberg via Amy]

• • Star parties at Octagon Barn with Dudley Observatory

1) Hilltowns-wide “studio Open Houses” for artists and crafters

Band concerts

Arts and Crafts shows

NEXT MEETINGS - All at 7:00 PM:

• 03/28: Knox Town Hall: John and Jane
• 04/18: Westerlo at Dormansville Hiawatha Grange : Jack Milner
• 05/09: Rensselaerville: Barb Husek

Respectfully submitted, Phoebe Beebe