It might not come with a free tote bag. But a donation in support of Elon’s downtown development district may nevertheless be worth a little something for those willing to dig out their wallets.
That, at least, is hope that Jill Weston, the town’s downtown director, was nursing on Tuesday when she appeared before Elon’s town council to present a new sponsorship program for the district’s activities.
Weston informed the town’s leaders that she has rolled out program on behalf of the nonprofit board that promotes the eight-block development district through special events and other initiatives. She added that, in order to encourage outside contributions to these activities, she has come up with some ways to recognize donors based on the scale of their financial support.
One of Weston’s innovations was to offer metallic designations like “silver” and “gold” to businesses and organizations that make substantial donations to specific events. Weston said that the more valuable metals will be reserved for larger donations – with the “platinum” level reserved for benefactors who give $3,500 to a single event or endeavor.
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Other Elon coverage in this week’s edition:
• $2 million fire truck used as evidence that town’s $15.4 million savings account can be justified – cited as example after newspaper’s editorial criticism of excessive tax revenues accumulating in excessive savings : https://alamancenews.com/town-points-to-2m-fire-truck-as-reason-for-keeping-large-municipal-savings-acct/
• Town will let non-profits hook up to town’s electricity in plaza: https://alamancenews.com/elon-council-rewires-policy-to-let-nonprofits-plug-into-downtown-plazas-electricity/
The town’s downtown director added that, at this point, the only donor to qualify for any of these categories is Greenhawk Development, which joined the platinum tier with a $3,500 contribution to a fall concert series dubbed “Music at the Plaza.” The driving force behind two development projects that have stirred up some controversy on Elon’s northern perimeter, Greenhawk is apparently the only donor, so far, to have received one of Weston’s metallic honorifics.
Weston also presented the council with a second promotion to recognize donors who make regular contributions to support the board’s general activities. Here too, donors can qualify for different distinctions based on how much they give. A donation of $250 a year, for example, will distinguish the contributor as a “friend” of downtown, while a $500 pledge will make one a “believer.” Meanwhile, anyone who gives at the $1,000 and $2,500 level will be honored as a “defender” and a “champion” respectively.
Before the council lent its endorsement to these proposals, its members got tangled up in debate over various hypothetical scenarios that Weston’s sponsorship program didn’t seem to address. Mayor Emily Sharpe eventually put the brakes on this discussion as her colleagues began to wonder what the downtown board would do if it gets a donation from a group that it doesn’t consider entirely wholesome.
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“This is one of those things that we could ‘what if’ to death,” the mayor said, “and right now we only have one donor.”
