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• The other marketing project I am involved with, the communications and <br /> brand project, is just starting. City Clerk Sandy Peine is the staff lead for this <br /> project and this project will not begin in earnest until after the election. <br /> Currently we are looking at identifying everywhere the elk (our brand) shows <br /> up and doing an inventory for each use of the elk. <br /> Duckor and Associates, Inc. is also helping the city with this project and has <br /> a similar project with the Elk River Municipal Utilities. General Manager <br /> Bryan Adams is a key player in coordinating these two projects together so <br /> that the brand between the city and the utilities is similar if not identical and <br /> that our uses of the elk are also similar if not identical. Members of the <br /> project team include Sandy, Bryan, Michele, Cathy, Bruce West, Tom Zerwas, <br /> (or his representative from the police department), and me. <br /> The downtown or central business district is referenced in both the Economic <br /> Development Strategic Plan and in the Industrial Marketing Plan. In both <br /> plans the emphasis is on redevelopment, an action plan, and design <br /> guidelines in order to improve the attractiveness of the area. Recently the <br /> downtown was a topic for a joint meeting between the City Council and the <br /> HRA due mainly to the King/Main redevelopment project and the sidewalk <br /> • plan for this area. At that joint meeting staff received direction to continue <br /> working with the HRA and downtown business owners in order to combine <br /> our existing downtown plans with the more recent riverwalk trail plans into <br /> one overall master plan. This will take a number of meetings and a fair <br /> amount of staff time and effort to complete. In a sense, the city was lucky <br /> that it controlled the King/Main site so that it could ensure quality <br /> redevelopment, but lacking any clear standards makes us vulnerable to a <br /> private redevelopment project that is completed without city involvement. In <br /> this type of situation the private developer could propose almost anything <br /> that meets the letter of the code without appropriate consideration to the <br /> "look and feel" of the downtown area. A master plan or guide should help us <br /> manage the downtown redevelopment areas. <br /> s:\eda\meetings\mktgpin.doc <br /> • <br />