“Our Town” Proposes to Boost Local Economy

By: Rebecca Friedman

Washington, D.C.—The National Endowment for the Arts proposed in their Fiscal Year 2011 Budget Request a new program that will revitalize the arts industry in local communities while at the same time increase their economy.

The new program entitled “Our Town” has a projected cost of $ 5 million. In its proposal, the NEA stated that “Our Town” would help “to revitalize and improve the livability of communities, provide joy and inspiration, and restore a sense of pride and community spirit.”

“We have requested five million to make approximately thirty-two grants,” Victoria Hutter, a spokesperson for the NEA, said.

The communities that would be focused on are “communities of all sizes and locations…especially those that are facing economic challenges but are interested in the arts,” according to the NEA’s budget proposal. The communities that the NEA will bestow grants must meet three factors. They must have partnerships with public industries, such as libraries, and private industries, such as community organizations. The second factor is public engagement. Communities whose ability to have the arts in their towns, are limited “by geography, ethnicity, economics, or disability,” will be considered. The last factor is durability. The town must demonstrate the lasting impact of the grant.

One of the resources the NEA used for its analysis was a report done by the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices. The report entitled, “2009 Arts & the Economy: Using Arts and Culture to Stimulate State Economic Development,” laid out how “creative industries” could stimulate a community’s economy.

“The most important thing is to understand what creative industries are,” Erin Sparks, a writer and editor for the 2009 report, said.

Sparks explained that there is more to the creative industries than just music and theatre. Architecture and museums can be counted in the creative industry spectrum. This is seen when a city or town’s downtown area uses architecture to renovate the area. A nice downtown “leads to a thriving community and economy,” said Sparks.

The question is how much economic growth can a city actually achieve?

According to Sparks, “Economic growth comes from new businesses. ” Creative industries do not seem to have any economic growth “cap” because new businesses “spur growth by their very nature,” Sparks said.

A city in Missouri is currently working on a program that fits right into “Our Town”

In February 2010 a group in Joplin, Missouri proposed an idea called “Connect2Culture. This program would be used for “encouraging growth and development…that enhances the arts, education, and the economy,” Clifford Wert, a co-chair on the Connect2Culture committee said.

Joplin has a population of less than 50,000, but with the Connect2Culture program, Wert hopes to attract upwards of 250,000 people on a daily basis. To do this, the Connect2Culture program would build a cultural arts center in the downtown area.

This center would stimulate Joplin’s economy in multiple ways: tourism, additional sales tax revenue and increase property value, just to name a few.

Wert notes that economic growth is one of the main goals of Connect2Cutlure. “We view this as a definite boost to out market economy.”

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Street Sees Action During Hostage Situation

By Rebecca Friedman

Sitting at his desk sipping the Caramel Macchiato that he had picked up from the Starbucks across the street, Michael Chambers was helping his customers upgrade their phone package. When Chambers looked through the glass windows across from his desk he saw something odd, police cars and people running down the street.

“I was thinking, what is everybody running from?” said Chambers 23, who works as a sales representative at the Verizon store across the street from the Discovery Channel building that was taken hostage on September 1^st of this year. Colesville Road, the street across from the Discovery Channel saw plenty of action the day James J. Lee stormed the Discovery Channel building and took three hostages, with Lee eventually being shot and killed.

“Everybody was here. SWAT team, everything was blocked off. They had the bomb squad,” said Chambers, bouncing on his toes and acting the scene out for his fellow employees. The young man is like a little boy describing his favorite action movie when he discusses what happened that day

Though Chambers was having a good time describing what had happened, there is downside to his story. While all the action was happening, people were running into the Verizon store “traumatized. It was like a refugee camp,” said Chambers.

Verizon was not the only store on Colesville Road to see the events of the day.

“At 1:00 we noticed a bunch of people funneling about the street,” said Michael Garson 39, general manager of Flippin Pizza a small restaurant next to Verizon. This is a sobering fact considering that the pizza joint “had a delivery at Discovery, 12:45. He must have just missed the guy,” said Garson. One of Garson’s employees nudges him, telling him to tell who called the restaurant that day. Garson laughs and says, “You know something’s going on when CNN, TMZ, Fox News, is calling.” Garson felt it was important to talk to the media. “We heard so many things that were inaccurate. They said everyone was evacuated, but they weren’t. The garage doors open up and hundreds of people come flying out.”

Even with the streets blocked off and the restaurant on lockdown, Garson still managed to do good during a bad situation. He gave out free pizza to the businesses on the street and those that were forced to stay in the restaurant due to the lockdown. When asked about it Garson just shrugs it off. “We fed them because where we’re they going to go to eat?”

Like Chambers, Garson is in amazement at all the enforcement that came out.

“It was like a movie, the actually ending. You never hear the SWAT team coming in.” In a way it could be portrayed as a fairytale as all three hostages that Lee took were not hurt, nor were any of the 1,900 Discovery employees according to Yahoo News.

There are those who just wanted to leave the situation alone. “ I wasn’t really thinking about them [those who were in the Discovery building],” said Stephanie Moore, 21, a student at Sanz, a college on Colesville Road. School had just been dismissed and Moore wanted to leave the growing crowd.

Of course there are those who saw it play out until the very end. With a grin on his face and shaking his head, Chambers chuckles. “It was an interesting day.”

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Interview with Molly Hoak

Threat to the "Watchdog"

American Forum

By Rebecca Friedman

Washington, D.C.--Leading journalists said Tuesday the decline of mainstream news bureaus in Washington, D.C., is threatening the journalist's role of "watchdog."

Politicians, for example, have a tendency to make themselves look better to local voters and it's the job of the reporters to catch that.

Melinda Wittstock the founder and CEO of Capital News Connection, said, as part of a panel, "All too often they [the politicians] ask me are you local press or national," "Why are you asking me that? Is it a different story if I'm local or national?"

Professor Wendell Cochran the moderator of the panel and School of Communications faculty member, agreed that a main job of journalists is to be "on the ground" in the Capitol with experience.

"You can't let those people run around Washington without a chaperone," said Cochran, eliciting laughter.

"The government is getting large," added Wittstock. We need a watchdog.

Tyler Marshall, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist said these developments could threaten the democratic powers for voters. The voters do not find how they voted until after their local representative has already made the decision.

"They're finding out how they vote largely from press releases from the staff, which is far from objective."

Wittstock said that reporters are best able to speak to important Washington policymakers such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. "Regular folks can't do that," said Wittstock. "That's why we have to."

Despite some bad news for print journalism, which has declining since 2005 by 2.8 percent daily, the panelists agreed that the Internet has opened opportunities for reporters.

"The Internet is adding jobs for the short term," said Marshall who has just completed a comprehensive study on "The New Washington Press Corps" for the Project for Excellence in Journalism. The study shows while there is a decline in mainstream press, there is as strong a growth in narrow, special interest niche press . According to Marshall's study the number speciality magazines, newspapers and newsletters, has risen by half since the mid-1980s. Newsletters alone are up nearly two thirds.

Panelists said blogs are another avenue for reporting. "They will not go anywhere anytime soon. I think they're pretty permanent," said Suzanne Struglinski, senior editor of Provider magazine.

"I think there is more room for entrepreneurship. Report, blog and so forth and make a name for yourself," said Mark Whitaker, the senior vice president for NBC News. Blogs can be found on many newspapers websites and are used to display news and some blogs are just used for smaller stories. It is just another out for reporting in these papers. Mainstream media is till trying to figure out how to use blogging to their best advantage, according to the panel.

At the American Forum, sponsored by WAMU 88.5 and C-SPAN the panelist were able to answer the questions of students who attended the evening and give advice in their fields of work. The audience could hear the the C-SPAN music playing in the background and part of Mary Graydon was taken up by the shows camera crew. The American Forum has been a part of the SOC for the past 20 years. This forum was called Washington Watchdogs: An Endangered Species?

Despite the challenges in the business, students attending the forum sought advice on how to become journalists.

"You need good interviewing skills and good research skills," advised Struglinski, a former regional reporter.

"Being a good writer is key in any job," added Whitaker.

The panelists said new journalists need to go to a news outlet or create their own media outlet that will pay them. With the economic model falling there are journalists who have to find other ways to make a livings, Struglinski being an example. A student asked if there was a danger to journalists making money rather then focusing on finding and reporting the news first.

"You need to go where the paycheck is," said Marshall. "It's not because they [mainstream media] don't want the reporters. The business model is collapsing around us."

The panelist agreed that despite the financial crisis in the journalism industry, they still loved their profession.

"My children asked me why I wanted to be a journalists," said Marshall. "I told them I never wanted to grow up."

Struglinski agreed. "It's a front seat to history. You can see amazing things and get to tell everyone about it."

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Spring Break

New reference librarian at Bender

Susan Adland

By Rebecca Friedman

Washington, D.C.-Imagine a librarian and you may conjure up "The Music Man's" Marian, known for her severe bun and uptight ways that only love could loosen. Or Hogwarts's Madam Pince with her withering gaze over terrified students might also come to mind.

But none of the stereotypical versions of a librarian fit Susan Adland who works in the reference area of Bender Library at American University.

Adland has been affiliated with libraries throughout D.C. since the late 1970s, but she never thought it would become her life's work.

"It was sort of a zigzag path," said Adland, who has worked in an official capacity as a reference librarian since September.

Adland studied art history in college in the late 1960s and worked and lived abroad for two years. When she couldn't find a job in the art world she moved back to the United States and began doing temp work at a law firm, working in the law library. After being offered a permanent position, Adland went to Catholic University for two years. She received her master's in library services in 1980.

Though not her original intention to get a M.L.S., Adland was not disappointed in her career move as "a master in library services has a lot of potential."

But it was during college that hints of a career in helping to manage public treasures surfaced.

During her junior year of college Adland lived in Richmond, England and interned at the Victoria and Albert Musuem-which houses some of the earliest known toys. Adland had a year's course on fine and decorative arts, the end of which she received a diploma.

That course sent her to the Netherlands for seven months interning at a museum in The Hague. There, Adland catalogued an Italian glass collection and then worked on an exhibit of 18th and 19th century watches.

As Adland described her life's path, she calmly sips on strong tea laced with French La Perruche brown sugar cubes, that come from the West Indies and are exported to France. Adland had this sugar in her tea while she lived in England, and so they are a ritual she has embraced.

"I like tea in the afternoon," she said, and not the weak herbal tea found in the United States.

Wearing a purple and green scarf from Turkey, Adland sets down her tea to swivel her chair so she can look on the Internet for the spelling of the sugar cubes. Whenever a question or new topic of conversation arises, she does the same, checking the location of an English village or a calender of events.

Adland said she loved her time in England because of everything she got to take in there. The theatre, the Royal Ballet, and the making of many friends was amazing to her. Adland found someone else who shared that love for the country as well.

"Even though we hadn't known each other that long, it was nice to share some of that love of England," says Alex Hodges, a co-worker of Adland's. Some of Hodges's family lives in Richmond, England, on the same street that Adland stayed while she lived there. Hodges and Adland had only met in August of 2008, but the two bonded over their mutual tastes of English food and teas. "We love the same biscuits , McVities. She likes the plain chocolate digestive biscuits. Also some strong tea from Marks and Spencer," said Hodges. Those are the items that Hodges brought back from his recent trip to England, for Adland.

Upon returning to the United States, in the 1980s Adland took her love of culture and worked as the film librarian for the Canadian Embassy, becoming exposed to Canadian books and authors.

"You don't realize that all these other countries and all these other nations support their arts programs," she said. "The United States does not support the arts without strings attached. We have no national theatre."

After the embassy job, Adland married and in the early 1990's had a daughter, Sara. She opted to stay home with her for six and half years while working a few days a week at the National Portrait Gallery as a docent. A docent is one who works with the public to help them understand the collections and exhibits that the museum puts on. Like at the museum in The Hague, Adland was a creator in some of the exhibits.

When her daughter Sara was in first grade, Adland went back and took a children's literature class, which led her to being a high school librarian at St. Albans School for Boys, a Washington prep school.

In 2008, "I needed a change from what I was doing," said Adland. Adland was ready to start working with older students.

Adland brings all her varied experience to bear in her position at AU.

"She has had world and cultural experience," Said Hodges. "She will be able to help us understand the bridge between high school and college transition, she has had a full career of working with different types of students."

From Adland's perspective, its the job that teaches her. "Mentally it is a challenge, " she said, "learning all these databases, responding to all these questions," said Adland.

One minute she is researching economics, another history and she must also help students with their technical questions, such as what the best keyword would be to find a book, answer phones at the reference desk, teaches class in how to use Aladdin and responds to faculty with their classroom questions.

In the Aladdin classes, Adland must show the students searching strategy, research skills and basic introduction to the program. The variety is good for Adland who likes to keep her brain going. "I like the variety of kids too. I love it."

Adland "helps with the glazed eyes," laughed Hodges. He said she can connect with people very easily.

"She is a good librarian because she has a lot of intellectual curiosity and a real interest in what students are working on. This makes helping them so much easier and the quality of a reference librarian's work really shows under these circumstances. She also has a real interest in students as people and often carries on good conversation with them, which is endearing," said Patricia West, Adland's boss.

Although Adland is new to the AU community, Hodges said he feels he can learn from her.

"I think she's got an innate capability to make learning fun. She's lived in Washington, she's lived in other countries and she's had a lot of life experience."

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Inaguration at the Tavern

Tavern

By Rebecca Friedman

Washington, D.C.-From near and far, they flooded into the nation's capital to see the swearing in of the first African-American president. What some didn't expect was they they would end up trading seats on the Mall for a plastic chair and a projector in the Tavern at American University.

Sarah Bott, an American University alumna, traveled from Oregon for the inaguration of Barack Obama. Bott, who works for the mayor's office in Portland, said she wanted "to be a witness to history." But after Bott and her family stayed up for 48 hours, arriving on the Mall at 2 a.m. when temperatures were in the teens, they ran out of steam before the big moment arrived.

The family had become, "frozen blocks of flesh and that's just not fun." Bott said. "I just don't think that catching pneumonia is going to help us move the centaury forward more quickly."

The family sought refuge at Bott's former university, ending up with a multitude of others, mostly students, in the local gathering place called the Tavern on the first floor of the Mary Graydon Center building.

"As far as I'm concerned I hit a home run," said the alumna.

The family settled in on the black plastic chairs and made themselves comfortable, taking in the warmth that the Tavern provided them. While waiting, they snacked on the food provided by the university. The family members milled in and out during the inaguration, but stayed put once Obama made an appearence. The family left only after the inaguration was over and a new president had been sworn in.

Bott was not the only visitor that had to chnage plans. Sarah Jones, a senior at Westfield High School, Ind. planned on standing on the Mall with her friend, Jessie Armstrong, an AU freshman. But they were thwarted by the daunting security measures in place, near the swearing in.

"It [security] was not organized at all," according to Jones.

"We just knew we weren't getting in at all," agreed Armstrong.

Having witnessed massive crowds and the lack of information from security personnel, the pair decided to turn back. They too ended up at the Tavern.

"This [being in the Tavern]is more enjoyable," said Jones who said she was satisfied that she made it near the Mall at all.

"I did get to experience the atmosphere," she said.

Others had planned all along to go to the Tavern, given the promise of a warm and secure place to watch the inaguration.

Holding a "Goodbye Bush" sign, the youngest person in the Tavern was Ilan Cohen, the 8-year-old son of the university's Rabbi Ken Cohen. "I counted 19 heads," said the Rabbi commenting on the number of people he had seen enter since e had stopped by. This was before the inaguration began that the Rabbi started to count.

By the end of the inaguration the Tavern had standing room only. About 60 people, sitting shoulder to shoulder, tried to make room for one another as they faced the wall-filling screen. Others walked around the perimeter of the room, biding their time until the inaguration started.

A gentle hum of conversation ceased when Obama appeared on the projection screen ready to make his entrance. As a woman on the screen mouthed "Thank you Jesus" during the opening prayer, the crowd sat in silence. As Obama was sworn into office, the whole group jumped up, cheered, and clapped their hands.

Carla Arguta, a facilities worker at American, explained the meaning of the moment. "We vote for the change. And so we hope for Obama to change the economy." Pointing to her coworker Olga Blanco," She is ready for the change."

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