The Monticello Advertising and Promotions Commission held their monthly meeting on Monday, March 27, in the conference room at the Hampton Inn.
Commission Chair Shannon Herman called the meeting to order, and the minutes from February's meeting were approved. The commission members then moved to approve the previous month's financial report, and to pay on an open invoice for the advertisement of bids.
The main discussion of the meeting centered around the schedule of upcoming events that the commission has planned for Monticello.
Ryan Copico opened with the Spring on the Square event which is scheduled for Friday, May 19. This event will be a night time market with vendors, organizations, and live entertainment. According to Copico, within the first 24 hours of advertising to vendors, he had more than 30 vendors show interest, and that number doesn't include food trucks that have shown interest.
The next event mentioned will be Fireworks and Food Trucks, scheduled for Saturday, July 1. This years fireworks will be provided by the same company who put on last year's show, Hog Wylde Pyro.
With no other items on the agenda, commission member Mike Wigley brought up the subject of the proposed event center. Several of the members of the committee brought up the idea of traveling to tour facilities in towns that are similar in size and demographic to Monticello. Stuttgart and Arkadelphia were proposed as good candidates.
The commission members also discussed prioritizing what the center would actual have, so that they could avoid the issues they faced when the event center was proposed approximately 10 years ago. They were all in agreement that the building should be multipurpose, but they had varying opinions on what that would look like.
Wigley then addressed the "elephant in the room", the potential of the Marion Township becoming wet. The commission members seemed to all agree that for the event center to be able to draw in as many events as possible, and generate the most revenue, they would need the ability to serve alcohol at the facility. They discussed the issues with making this happen, and it was noted that getting members of the community to sign petitions allowing the issue to reach a ballot would be the biggest obstacle they would face. Several members were fairly certain that if this issue ever reached a ballot it would pass easily.
With nothing else to discuss, the next meeting was set for Monday, April 24.
