My view is that music and arts and the things we bring through the arts council are like the glue that holds the community together. It creates a cohesive neighborhood and adds to quality of life.
It's a first-class lineup of some of the greatest jazz players in the whole country.
Many of them are men who began to learn very young and showed extraordinary ability. Some have been at it for 50 years.
It's a common problem with older shopping centers.
We've made it a practice to go to jazz events across the country, and we're careful to get people who will draw a good crowd.
We've been in contact with the developer who owns the shopping center for the past two or three weeks, and they've got some prospective clients for the Wal-Mart space.
We have every reason to believe our existing suppliers will expand.
We're going to go on a reconnaissance mission to see how other cities are handling this problem, talk with some potential clients and the developers who will be there.
We've got to keep working with these developers and encouraging them to revitalize. We keep our fingers crossed and we're constantly developing the space, to get information out for prospective tenants and developers.
In the short term, any time a big deal like this happens nearby, it puts pressure on other businesses. They will lose some employees and probably some key employees. When a big company moves in, they'll take in the cream of the crop.
