by Jess Ward
Grinnell Renaissance, a community organization focused on downtown development, recently appointed student body president, Liz Allan ’04 to its board. The hope for Grinnell Renaissance is to bridge the gap between the community and the student body by advocating community involvement and supporting downtown growth. Allan is the first college student to be involved with the board, and the first student body president to take such an official role in community involvement.
As the first direct involvement between SGA and Grinnell Renaissance, Allan’s position will help to inform students of issues related to downtown development. Bill Menner, the Executive Director of Grinnell Renaissance, thinks that Allan’s addition to the board will be beneficial because she brings a unique perspective as a student. Allan will be able to alert the board to issues of student interest, such as more downtown apartments or later hours for businesses. Grinnell Renaissance will focus “on downtown development … to bring people to the downtown and hopefully bring them into businesses,” said Allan.
For Allan, being involved with the community is a fundamentally important aspect of her position. “[Town-gown relations] is something that I really try to keep in mind. The college can be very beneficial to the … health and well-being of the town.”
Grinnell Renaissance was created in 2000 as a joint venture of the college and city because members of the community saw a need for a focus on downtown development. Menner was brought in as Executive Director in 2001 to improve the vitality of the downtown for the entire community of Grinnell, including the college’s student body. The relationship between the student body and the community is an important dynamic of life in a small college town for Menner. “A vibrant downtown affects the quality of life for the community and … the quality for life for the college community,” said Menner.
Members of Grinnell Renaissance are concerned about connecting the spheres of campus and community. “I don’t think the students owe anything to the community, I think they owe it to themselves to be part of this experience,” said Menner.
By being on the board of Grinnell Renaissance, Allan hopes to support the downtown and increase the interest for prospective students and faculty of the college to come to the area. “Just having an attractive downtown … makes Grinnell an attractive place for potential students and faculty,” said Allan.
Two other students, Linda Wells ’05 and Caroline Logan ’05, have recently begun a campus group focused on town issues and student involvement. Their group, the Grinnell Community Action Group, is geared to make students more aware of what is offered downtown. “It’d be easy to go to school here and not be involved in the community. We’d all be missing out on a lot if we didn’t get involved,” said Wells.
“It’s a small campus in a small town, there is no way we can live really as two separate entities,” said Logan. “There has been a tremendous amount of activism by students on campus for national campaigns ... I think we could focus that energy on issues in our community.”
Wells and Logan want to focus on issues significant to the townspeople, rather than their own agenda. “We want to … find townspeople who are concerned with these issues and then work with them,” said Wells.
The city of Grinnell is in a state of renewal which is being fueled by many efforts, including Grinnell Renaissance. Six months ago when both downtown drugstores and the theatre closed, there was concern that the downtown was dying. Part of the job of Grinnell Renaissance is to ensure that that does not happen by increasing business and services. Menner anticipates that there will be many new things coming to the downtown area in the next few years, including a new three-plex cinema by fall of 2004 funded by local investors.
Allan and Menner hope that having a renovated theater in town will bring people from outlying communities into Grinnell and increase economic revenue by $750,000 a year according to an economic impact study mentioned by Menner. “We view [the cinema] as an economic engine for the entire downtown,” said Menner.
The town is eager to welcome involvement from the students. “When we bring the community together downtown, if students are not there, it’s not community,” said Menner.
In an effort to increase student awareness about resources downtown, GCAG is working on a packet of information about town businesses which should be available on campus in a few weeks.
GCAG and Allan believe that students need to be made aware of these resources and both are making an effort to increase consciousness about the town and encourage integration between the town and students. “When you’re living here nine or ten months out of the year, you should really think of the town of Grinnell as where you live and start to use the town for things,” said Allan.
Two ways for students to get directly involved are to volunteer with community activities and to support the local economy and businesses in the downtown district. “One of the things I think really helps though is the community service in town … It’s really about that communication,” said Allan.
GCAG and Menner encourage shopping at businesses downtown rather than national corporations. “There are independent producers in Grinnell and around the area … who are at the mercy of these giant corporations. Students who want to support that local economy … that’s one thing they can do right away,” said Menner.
The other aspect of becoming involved in the community is to leave campus, get out there and see what Grinnell has to offer. “If you would get to know it, you will be enriched. [The town] is part of the experience,” said Menner.
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