By: Madison Fugate
On January 5th, there was a special called Stanton Tourism and Convention Commission meeting organized in order to discuss some potentially exciting updates for the city of Stanton. The commission would like to come up with a design to paint a mural on the water tower in an effort to build the city’s character. They plan to discuss the mural and approve a budget for this project at this meeting. According to the tourism director for this particular board, Natalie Faulkner, the board has already been working closely with an artist by the name of Jordan Justice to collaborate on a design and cost for the project. “We were all very impressed with his professionalism and craftsmanship,” Faulkner adds informing the board that Justice has painted murals all over the state. Justice has apparently visited the tower already and is eager to begin the project if given the opportunity. The bid for the artwork by Justice was “around $16,500” according to Faulkner. This quote will include lodging and labor. The board also plans to cut down trees around the tower in order to make it visible from the parkway. It was also made known that Justice will bring forward the design for this board to decide on. A motion to approve the amount that was requested carried unanimously.
Next to approve on the agenda was a quote for drive-in renovations from Justin Spencer. The board were all in favor of this particular quote and deemed it as very reasonable. A motion was passed to approve Spencer’s bid. There was also a motion passed to approve some concrete work for the drive-in. The board also discussed the hope of being able to offer events to the public this year at the drive-in if circumstances allow. The board talked last meeting about kicking the events off with a concert series or a music festival. Faulkner informed the board she had reached out to a local artist, Chelsea Nolan, to have her approach on ideal contacts for performances. The board had even visited the possibility of maybe even hiring Nolan as some sort of management position or booking agent over these events in the future, as well as performing. Nolan was said to be putting together a list to discuss at the next upcoming meeting. A NCAA view party during the NCAA basketball tournament at the drive-in was introduced as an idea as well. Ultimately, the board planned to await the final decisions for the majority of the items discussed until the next meeting on January 19th. With that, the meeting was adjourned and several items will await the Stanton Tourism and Convention Commission at their next meeting.