Happy 50th Anniversary to the Putnam County Playhouse!

We are nearing the end of what Mayor Sue Murray officially proclaimed "Putnam County Playhouse 50th Anniversary Week."

Yes, this week, May 22-28, 2011, has been all about celebrating the Putnam County Playhouse's big milestone!

Above are some photos we took outside the playhouse recently, as well as a shot of the banner hanging near City Hall commemorating the anniversary. The Banner-Graphic has put together a great series of stories on the history of the theater -- you can read the first installment of the series by clicking here.

Don't forget: the playhouse is having an open house tomorrow, May 28, from 3 to 5 p.m. There will be refreshments and, of course, entertainment.

What's your favorite memory of the playhouse? Be sure to share it below! And here's to 50 more years of fun at the Putnam County Playhouse!

Putnam RISE earns well-deserved attention

We thought you'd enjoy this story from the Herald-Times in Bloomington. It's a great article about Putnam RISE, a broad partnership that's bringing energy savings and investments to schools, homes and businesses across the county.

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Putting the ‘green’ in Greencastle
Putnam RISE involves whole county in saving energy

By Dawn Hewitt331-4377 | dhewitt@heraldt.com
April 8, 2011

An initiative is under way in Putnam County that encourages residents, civic organizations and governmental units to cut energy use and support the local economy. Energy challenges are heating up homes and schools, with cash and prizes valued at more than $40,000 at stake.

Some lucky resident of Putnam County — Greencastle is the county seat — will win a “Green Home Makeover” that includes four new energy-efficient home appliances; 100 homes will receive free energy audits; and 21 homes will get weatherized — for free.

Schools are competing, not only to cut their March and April electric and natural gas bills relative to the same months in 2010, but also to get households to sign on to an Energy Saving Pledge, in which residents promise to take any or all of dozens of actions to cut energy consumption and to save money on utility bills.

The project is called Putnam RISE — Renewal, Investment, Savings and Efficiency — and is funded by the Putnam County Community Foundation and the Vectren Foundation. Partners are numerous, including all 16 schools in the county’s four public school corporations; the Greencastle Chamber of Commerce; Greencastle Presbyterian Church; and Shuee & Sons Great Buys Plus, the local store that will donate the four appliances.

Similar initiatives have been undertaken or are under way in Monroe County — examples include free home energy audits from the city of Bloomington , the Earth Care interfaith coalitions’s energy conservation program and Indiana University ’s own campuswide energy challenge competition. However, Putnam County ’s approach is to reach multiple constituencies with a single, comprehensive program.

As of Tuesday, 1,005 homes have taken the Energy Saving Pledge in Putnam County , which counted only 12,374 households in the 2000 Census. That means 8 percent of the county’s households are participating.

And for reasons Greencastle Sustainability Commission Chairman Steve Setchell can’t explain, 21 households in Indianapolis , Terre Haute , Bloomington and elsewhere have signed the online pledge as well.

“Our interest is, on the most broad level, to help households across county to secure energy savings from efficiency and conservation efforts represented in the pledge,” Setchell said. “Greencastle schools, for example, have been working on this since 2006, and have secured well over a half-million dollars in savings at a time when budgets are streamlined. That’s money we can reinvest in teachers, students and instruction.”

The Greencastle Chamber of Commerce is on board, too, organizing a buy-local campaign that will offer “Buy Local Bucks” — coupons given with certain purchases at local retailers that are good for discounts at other local stores. That component of Putnam RISE is expected to kick off May 1.

“We realized we wanted to strengthen the value of local consumption, realizing that local business are the red, beating heart of the community,” Setchell said.

Setchell said Greencastle’s mayor, Sue Murray, is an enthusiastic proponent of Putnam RISE.

“Efforts to make our greater community more energy efficient are a benefit to all. Not only can it help individuals, households, schools, and municipalities save money, the benefits of learning more sustainable practices are good for the planet and last a lifetime,” Murray said in an email. “Sustainability is something I have been interested in before taking office, and as a city, we have worked hard to improve our practices, and are very proud to be the only city in Indiana to receive Indiana Association of Cities and Towns’ Green Community of the Year award each of the three years that the state evaluation competition has been offered.”

The Greencastle Sustainability Commission says in its mission statement that “it will take a village to achieve environmental solutions to strengthen our community, economy, culture and quality of life.”

Putnam RISE has invited not just the village, but the entire county to reach together for that common goal.

Stellar Communities Success

We received some outstanding news today! The City of Greencastle was selected as one of the two pilot communities for the state's new multi-year, multi-million-dollar Stellar Communities program!

We are so proud of the hard work that so many people put into our proposal for this program. There's no doubt that our strong partnership with DePauw played a huge role in this positive outcome. THANK YOU to everyone who did their part to ensure that Greencastle came out on top.

We'll share more information soon on what this new state funding will mean to the city's strategic plans for the next few years, but in the meantime, click here to read Lt. Gov. Becky Skillman's news release on the Stellar Communities program, or click here to check out the Banner-Graphic's story.

One last note -- Lt. Gov. Skillman will be here on Thursday herself, to make the news official! It will be a great day!

2011 State of the City

Greencastle Mayor Sue Murray shared her thoughts on the "State of the City" in the Banner-Graphic this week. Below you can read the entirety of her remarks. Please feel free to start your own discussion on Greencastle's successes and challenges in the comments section at the end of this post. Thanks!

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When asked, “How are things in Greencastle?” my response is, “We are paying our bills; we finished the year in the black; and we have continued to provide the services our citizens expect.” In these times of economic challenge I am proud and relieved to be able to make that report.

Without a doubt we are in such an enviable position because of the hard work, efficiencies found, and fiscal diligence of our employees and their supervisors. To all of them, I again, say thank you.

2010 was a year of other significant accomplishments also. I would like to share some of those with you.
• We held our first Youth Engagement Summit.
• We received two AARA grants totaling $99,767 that provided for the retrofitting of all remaining traffic lights to LED technology and a new energy efficient lighting system to the Greencastle Fire Department.
• We completed the Albin Pond and Safe Route to School pathway projects.
• We initiated a sidewalk cost-share program for property owners.
• We entered into a “Friendship City” agreement with Qianjiang City, China.
• 9 holes, of a disc golf course, were completed at Big Walnut Sports Park.
• We were named a Tree City for the 11th year and for the first time, received the Growth Award from the Arbor Day Foundation, for our tree planting efforts.
• We completed the North Jackson Lift Station.
• We were able to pave a second parking lot at the Big Walnut Sports Park.
• We extended the curbside trash contract with expanded recycling at no increase in cost.
• We conducted a second series of neighborhood community meetings.
• The city’s Sustainability Commission’s Putnam RISE proposal received the $100,000 Envision ’11 Grant from the Putnam County Community Foundation.
• We received a Disaster Recovery Grant from OCRA (Office of Community and Rural Affairs) of $530,000 for the needed renovations and improvements to the Albin Pond Lake Dam.
• We were named the Green Community of the Year by IACT (Indiana Association of Cities and Towns) for the third time in as many years.
• We were one of two Indiana cities in the final competition for the 2010 Award for Municipal Excellence given by the National League of Cities.
• We are one of twelve finalists for the Indiana Stellar Communities Pilot grant project.
• We are completing the transition to a radio meter reading system in the Water Department.
• We have received a Downtown Façade Planning Grant of $46,620 from OCRA.

2010 found our population moving just over the 10,000 mark. (Our first census information has us as 10,326 strong.)

Looking to the future and securing our place in it, is a challenging responsibility. There are many influences, opportunities, and coincidences that are outside of municipal control, but have a profound effect on how we plan and how we do our jobs. We will continue to do the daily work of cities: to provide for the public safety, utility services, park and recreational opportunities, planning and building support, a resting place for our departed, and road and sidewalk rehabilitation. We will also continue to look for partnerships and chances for collaboration that will help us grow and enhance our human, social and physical capital. If we do these things, I am confident that we, as a community, will continue to thrive. 2010 was a good year. 2011 has the possibility to be even better.

City Workers Deserve Gratitude

Mayor Sue Murray wrote a letter to the editor, praising public service employees for their great work during the recent ice storm.

The letter appeared in the Feb. 4 Banner-Graphic -- here's a link to it, and the full text follows, as well.
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To the Editor:
I have never been more proud of our city employees than I am today.

The challenges that the storms this week have brought have been plentiful and burdensome.

To a person their greatest concern has been how they can help to be sure that people in our community are safe; whether that's working extended shifts, taking on new responsibilities at the EOC (Putnam County Emergency Operations Center) or helping other departments.

City streets have been plowed and treated by the 24-hour work of our Department of Public Works.

Our Fire Department has responded to nearly one hundred calls and helped clear trees and branches from roadways.

Greencastle Police personnel spent three days working two 12-hour shifts patrolling our streets and answering the many calls from our citizens that came through Central Dispatch.

Our utility personnel have weathered the challenges of power outages and worked diligently to keep our water and wastewater systems operating at full efficiency.

Parks personnel are clearing walkways and cleaning debris and our cemetery crew has continued to provide services to families and their loved ones despite the weather.

All of this has been done without complaint, despite loss of sleep and time with their own families.

We all owe them a debt of gratitude.

What we have also learned is that events like this affect us all, regardless of township lines. Our ability to have a centralized, unified approach to dealing with emergency issues is our best response.

Our countywide emergency management team has done an outstanding job coordinating and tracking our responses. Duke Energy has brought in extra crews to restore power to the over 7,000 in this district that lost power and the National Guard stood ready to help with the response.

The meteorologists remind us that if we had received freezing rain rather than sleet our challenges would have been greater. For those of us now on the backside of the ice storm of 2011, we know that this challenge would have been greater if it weren't for the coordinated efforts of all involved and the dedication of the public service employees throughout the county.

Mayor Sue Murray

City of Greencastle

Youth Engagement Summit survey: We need your input!

By Nathan Mullins, DePauw University sophomore and Mayor’s Office intern


Hi, I’m Nathan Mullins and I’m a sophomore at DePauw University. I’ve been interning with Mayor Sue Murray for the past three weeks of winter term.

The beginning of my time here was mostly spent researching community development corporations, as well as helping in whatever way I could with the city’s proposal for a Stellar Communities grant.

More recently, I’ve been assisting with the plans for this year’s Youth Engagement Summit (YES) -- set for Feb. 27 -- an effort aimed at getting the 16-22 year olds of our city involved in the community and informed about what’s going on where they live.

Though we learned many things through the city’s first-ever YES in 2010, it was clear that this age group represented an untapped resource. That’s why the city is organizing another summit in 2011, as well as a new survey that’s being conducted in conjunction with it.

The survey is a simple way to gather data on the trends of young adults in order to better implement government resources that cater to them. Though it’s short, the results will offer City Hall a better understanding of young people in the area, as well as a set of data that can be utilized well into the future.

When you have a moment, please click here and take part in our survey. We’d appreciate your input!

And please mark your calendars for the 2011 Youth Engagement Summit, scheduled for Sunday, Feb. 27, from 2 to 4:30 p.m. at City Hall. We hope to see you there!

Have any thoughts you'd like to share about the YES, or your experiences as a young person living in Greencastle? Post them below.

Thanks!

Successful ArtsFest Draws DePauw and Greencastle Communities Together

By Gigi Jennewein Fenlon, DePauw Coordinator of Arts Publicity and Marketing Chair of ArtsFest Planning

How do you make a community thrive? Bring in the artists. So say experts on economically viable communities including Richard Florida, best known for his book, The Rise of the Creative Class, and so attempted DePauw University and members of the Greencastle community for a week in November.

For nine years, DePauw University has been offering ArtsFest, a seven-day gathering of writers, artists, thinkers, and performers. Each year's festival is organized around a theme such as borders, or the environment, or Shakespeare. And each year the intent of the organizers - a group that includes me - has been to make all events inclusive of and open to the entire Greencastle community. In 2010, we made that intent particularly obvious with our theme: Art & the Green Castle.

Our mission this year was to have both communities contributing to creating and enjoying the events of ArtsFest. To achieve this we included community members on the ArtsFest planning committee: a Greencastle art teacher, a staff member from the Putnam County Library and the owner of a gallery in town, among others.

This plan proved fruitful. The graphic design for this year's ArtsFest was created by local artist Jennifer Herrold. DePauw professor and poet Joe Heithaus spoke on the painting of his poem about Greencastle on the side of a West Walnut St. barn. The Putnam County Library teamed up with DePauw's Janet Prindle Institute for Ethics to produce "This I Believe" essays. Award-winning blues artist and local resident Tad Robinson headlined the closing night party. The DePauw-originated Greencastle Service Theatre and the Putnam County Museum collaborated on a project involving Greencastle High School students.

If you pressed me, I'd have to say that I'm most pleased with the Greencastle/DePauw collaboration on the Friday night Arts Walk through the Green Castle. For a two-hour period of time that began around 6:30 p.m., local residents and DePauw students, faculty and staff roamed the square to check out the arts. The Low Road Gallery and the GC Galleria were open and students from DePauw professor Cindy O'Dell's photography class were projecting images of Greencastle past and present onto the buildings.

I saw downtown Greencastle differently that night. I felt a sense of vibrancy and possibility. People were excited to be witnessing new ways of looking at their home.

And that excitement is being capitalized on, which couldn't make me happier. The emerging Greencastle Arts Council plans to formally kick off its existence by instituting regular "First Friday" art walks on the square. The group has chosen Friday, February 4 as its launch date, and hopes to unveil a piece of public art created by 5th year DePauw student Travis Lamothe.

I have listened to many friends and neighbors swoon over visits to towns of our size with lively arts scenes. As Greencastle is blessed with many wonderful creative and performing artists, I hope that the direction inspired by DePauw's Art & the Green Castle and the forthcoming efforts of the Greencastle Arts Council will "out" that creativity and make Greencastle similarly worthy of swooning.

What do you think about the role that arts play in the success of our community? Share your comments below.