Note: This is a story in progress. You might want to join the existing conversation on this topic. I’m excited to read about what people have to say! Please email…
The sign at the Rice County Landfill gate says: Bridgewater Township has enacted a host fee on all garbage and demolition effective January 1, 2008 for $3.33 per ton of…
Discussions among LocallyGrownNorthfield.org visitors blossom and fade, to resurface another time or never again. Representative Journalism Project stories have had a similar cycle so far, but I’d like to insert…
Northfield’s Meredith Fierke is getting more than a little attention from the Twin Cities media lately. She had her CD The Procession favorably reviewed last week by Culture Bully’s Jon…
A Better Northfield Starts With Flowers, Group Says
By Allyson Herbst
Northfield residents last summer couldn’t help but notice a striking change that bloomed outside the Northfield Public Library. Where once a few scrubby trees dotted a lawn of exposed landscaping fabric and mulch, new plantings sprang up and hundreds of petunias popped out of pots all around.
The Northfield Senior Center courtyard, decorated with a new flower arrangement by America in Bloom, Northfield
While the library played a role in its own makeover, the prime mover was actually a new Northfield civic group – a local branch of a national non-profit called “America in Bloom” (AIB) – that is devoted to catalyzing community improvement by planting flowers and trees.
Less than a year old, AIB-Northfield in 2008 planted around $3,000 worth of flowers around the town’s public library, post office, the Northfield Hospital, the Cannon Riverwalk and in Bridge Square. They created an inventory of Northfield’s civic assets; sponsored a “Downtown Window Box and Yard Contest;” and worked with the Mayor’s Youth Council (MYC) and the police to install flowerboxes on the pedestrian footbridge downtown.
“We’re just getting started,” says Northfield resident Pat Allen, the founder of AIB-Northfield and its current chairman. “We have big visions.”
HISTORICAL SIGNAGE
In 2009, Allen says one of AIB’s goals is to add 16 new hanging baskets to Northfield’s streets. Next year the group also plans to continue work on local historical site signage, an anti-graffiti project, and restoration of the city’s old train depot near 3d Street and Highway 3.
Paul Mulshine, opinion columnist for the Newark Star-Ledger, misses the point when he argues that citizens aren’t likely to voluntarily ‘cover,’ for example, city council meetings for their blogs in the same way that a reporter does for a newspaper.
Left: Bright Spencer alerted me that the ‘Cows Colleges and Contentment’ sign on North Hwy 3 near Dairy Queen is missing. Is the sign being repaired? Was it stolen? Right:…
There’s a Preserve America sign at the southwest end of the 5th St. Bridge, designating Northfield as a Preserve America community. We’re one of 9 Minnesota cities designated, though…
In today’s Star Tribune, local music writer Chris Riemenschneider has a piece titled “2008 recap: Just the best“. The photo at left, by Tom Wallace, illustrates the story. No doubt…
Allyson Herbst, a student in Doug McGill’s journalism class at Carleton College, has written a piece titled A Better Northfield Starts With Flowers, Group Says (PDF – full text below).
Earlier today I linked to and excerpted from an article in today’s Wall St. Journal (pointed out to me by Ross) titled: All I Wanted for Christmas Was a Newspaper; Bloggers are no replacement for real journalists.