July 28, 2014
To the Honorable Mayor and Village
Trustees;
Over the past week, I, acting as
President of the Lock 52 Historical Society, have been dealing with
the issue of a upcoming fund raiser and where to locate it.
Two years ago, the Board of the Lock 52
Historical Society signed up with Doug's Fish Fry to act as a host
for the traveling food wagon. At that time, the wagon was a new idea
and not too often seen in this area. This year, we have all been
disheartened to see the number of times that this wagon has been in
the area, especially when it comes to being the last in a long line
of events this year. However, as a Board, we made the choice to move
ahead with the event, if we could find a place the was suitable.
Last week, I was notified by Mentz Town
Supervisor McBath that the Village had passed a resolution banning
all outside food vendors on public property. This is a concern as we
had asked the Town for permission to locate the truck on Town owned
land next to their offices. After speaking with the Village Clerk, I
was under the impression that the resolution only applied to Schasel
Park, not all public property. I have passed this information along
to Supervisor McBath and she has allowed us to move forward with this
one event.
While I fully support the business
owners of the village and town, I do have concerns over such
reactionary responses to this perceived problem. Every organization
has to fund raise. Every scout troop, ball team, school group,
service group and historical society needs to make money in order to
carry out it's mission. How to make the money is a real issue for
everyone. And fund raising is a thankless, time consuming task that
no one likes to do.
I see any law or regulation that bans
this type of fund raising as a slippery slope. Where do we set the
limits of local volunteer organizations to fund raise? When someone
supports the Girl Scouts by purchasing cookies, or the Boy Scouts by
purchasing popcorn, they might not purchase cookies or popcorn at Ed
and Jeans. Don't church dinners or the Lock 52 spaghetti dinner steal
patrons from local or even regional restaurants? Even when someone
buys seasonal vegetables at the Farmers Market, they might be buying
less from Ed and Jeans or the grocery in Weedsport. And banning food
vendors and other sales from public spaces will not significantly
ease the problem. As I understand it, the churches can set up in
their lots, the school groups can set up in the school lot, even Lock
52 could set up on its property.
The real problem is traffic and that is
generated by offering a product that people want to buy. We at the
Lock 52 Historical Society struggle to offer a product that people
want to “buy”. We need to convince enough people that what we do
is worthy of supporting, either by memberships, donations, or through
fund raisers. If we don't, we will fade away. The Scouts, the Legion,
the Little League; all need to “sell” themselves in order to stay
in business. And all this “selling” will place us in conflict
with the local traditional business owners.
However, it needs to be understood that
local service and volunteer organizations can help the local business
owners, and there should be a symbiotic relationship between the two
sides. When people come to Port Byron to watch a ball game, visit the
Historical Society, or even attend a church; the potential is there
to have someone stop at the local gas station or restaurant. But it
goes much further that this.
Let me speak directly about Lock 52 for
a moment. If you search the Internet for Port Byron, you are likely
to see the work of the Lock 52 Historical Society, not posts or ads
from the local restaurants. As I said before, my goal is to put out a
product that attracts people to the work of Lock 52 and see it as
worthy of support. And, I will put forth that this outreach helps to
sell all of us in the village and town. My goal is to inform the
people of the world about the town and village, and as a result, draw
people to visit. I know this works as I have emails and letters from
people that who that people have found us on the Internet and have
arranged to come see something in the area.Certainly, there may not be streams of
people visiting Lock 52 and then flowing into the restaurants, but I
am willing to bet there are some that do.
This outreach doesn't cost the business
owners a dime, and we need to be finding ways to encourage all the
local organizations to expand this outreach, not restrict their
ability to do it. It really is that simple. When someone comes to
Port Byron, Montezuma, or Weedsport to see a historical bit of canal,
or see their family burial plot, hike or bike, or play ball; we
all have the potential to benefit.
I am sorry that some local businesses
feel that the many fund raisers are harming their businesses. I wish
there was a way to acquire the funds necessary to keep the doors open
and not fund raise. If the business owners have ways that we can all
achieve our goals and not fund raise, I would be very happy.
Personally I hate fund raising. But until then, I will argue that
Port Byron is stronger with us all here and all of us being active,
even if that puts us into competition with local businesses on
occasion.
As the president of a local volunteer
organization, I feel it only proper that if such a resolution were to
be passed, it would be nice to be given some sort of time frame
before implementation, such as 30, 60 or 90 days, so that current and
future plans could be adjusted.
I thank you for your time,
Michael Riley
President- Lock 52 Historical Society
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