We see that the Cecil County Young Republican Blog has just announced the creation of a Wes Walker for mayor of Elkton Facebook page. 

Click here to go the Walker campaign’s facebook.

Wes Walker became the first candidate to file as a candidate for the mayor’s post in Elkton in 2010, two county newspapers reported this week.  As Someone Noticed observed in July there’s a growing political buzz around the upcoming election.  The chatter on Main Street has it that four or five additional office-seekers are going to file, including the incumbent and former mayors.  Also up this spring are the commissioners seats presently held by Mary Jo Jablonski, the Elkton Alliance Director, and Gary Storke.

Walker is making the revitalization of the central business district a central platform in his campaign.  Taking note of the “18 vacant commercial properties in town,” he told the Cecil Whig, “I’d like to bring more business downtown.”  In a much more comprehensive interview in the Cecil Guardian, he added:  “In 2006-2007 Elkton officials were excited by the fact that vacant storefronts were full and that Elkton was becoming a future ‘hotspot’ with growth potential.  Just drive through town and look at the large amount of for rent, for sale, and going out of business signs.  Elkton is failing as an area that appeals to business owners and visitors alike,” Walker remarked.

A strong central business district is important to the critical to the quality of life in any community and as a Main Street businessperson Walker has a front row seat on how things are going.  When the county administrative offices relocated to the Delaware State Line in January 2008, taking nearly 200 workers with them, the Rising Sun Herald wrote:  ”Brothers Pizza isn’t the only food business that has been impacted by the relocation of the county offices. Wes Walker runs the Main Street Cafe across from the courthouse. ‘We’ve been hit hard here. I can tell the volume of sales is down. I am hoping that it will turn around,’ said Walker. He said he hopes that the Elkton Chamber/Alliance work to promote businesses. Walker said that he is grateful to the remaining employees, court workers and jurors that still turn out to eat. ‘The food is great and people still come,’ said Walker.”

Mayor Fisona is wrapping up his second term as the town’s leader.  When he ran for office, he made revitalization of the town center one of his top priorities.  Commissioner Jablonski serves as the executive director of the agency providing leadership in the revitalization of Main Street.

Another legacy media product is being offered to readers and advertisers in the county, starting this week. The weekly newspaper, the Cecil Guardian, joins a crowded field of traditional publications, which includes a cluster of new ones offering niches such as infomercials in print for local government, politicians and businesses, as well as classified advertising and light features. In an already crowded Cecil County marketplace, one that is undergoing radical change because of the economy, new distribution models, the commodization of content and changing reader habits, the challenge is to differentiate a product from the packed field, which includes a daily newspaper with a under-resourced website.

There is definitely a business opportunity here if someone will seize it for a need isn’t being filled, that being in the area of deeper, insightful articles.  That’s what once made newspapers so valuable. But to do that, one has to do more than provide infomercials, light features and classifieds, but if it’s approached in an old-fashioned journalistic style there just might be able to create a publication that has real value for advertisers. That requires a good dose of professional curosity on the part of the publication. When covering a story dig into the subject a little, ask reasonable follow-up questions, be a little skeptical of the facts periodically, and get other opposing viewpoints.  There’s typically more than one side to a story, especially when covering politicians and government. There’s an opportunity here and hopefully it is going to be filled. 

The publisher that fills this niche will build a successful product as external variables force changes in the media industry.  It requires making full use of multi-platform delivery, creating the primary web portal for all things Cecil County and the place to go on the web for local content, in addition to publishing content that readers are going to pour over so they’ll see those expensive advertisements.

As the local teaparty crowd and a rising, youthfully oriented conservative movement tries to create a discussion in Maryland’s 10th county about the role of government in Cecil County, this piece in USA Today caught our attention. 

From USA Today —

‘Political downsizing’ is latest weapon for voters

HAMBURG, N.Y. — Joe Killian rose at a taxpayers’ forum one night to bemoan the chronically high cost of government in western New York. “Nothing’s worked,” said the burly, 59-year-old water utility worker. “We’re the Cubs. This team don’t win.”It’s winning now. Discouraged by unemployment and depopulation and frustrated by politicians’ inability to solve either, voters aren’t just throwing the rascals out of office — they’re throwing out the offices.

 In what this region calls “political downsizing,” communities are voting by referendum to reduce the number of seats on town councils. The movement’s theory, as voiced by its founder, a gadfly named Kevin Gaughan: The best (and maybe only) way to cut government is to start with your own representatives.

 So far the downsizing movement is confined mostly to western New York, but it’s part of a national wave of frustration over big government that was illustrated this year by raucous town-hall-style meetings over health care and the rise of the Tea Party movement. Unlike those movements, downsizing is a proven hit at the ballot box.

 This year, all four towns that considered citizen-initiated referendums to trim their boards from five members to three have voted to do so.

Article continues on USA Today

From the Chestertown Spy

Budgeteers Kill Upper Shore (Again)

From the Watershed Chronicle

Department of Reader Response

During the short time I’ve been doing this website, I’ve had a few comments from people, mostly good, some not so much.  Normally, if I feel they call for a reply, I just keep the thread going under whatever post they were commenting on.  Earlier today, I received a comment that calls for a little more thorough response, however.

The Elkton Alliance is testing a new strategy to stimulate the revitalization of Main Street, the Cecil Whig and the Cecil Guardian are reporting.  In the downtown arts and entertainment district, the Alliance has opened an artists co-op shop, which presently contians six artists.  ”The idea came” to Commissioner Jablonski “after she heard about one in Cambridge, MD,” the Cecil Whig reported.  Once an ideal downtown property was located, the town’s revitalization organization rented the facility so they could facilitate space and cost sharing arrangements for artists.  The co-op will last through December and then the Alliance will review the program’s success and decide whether to continue the strategy.  In the Whig she also mentioned that this business model is successful in Cambridge.

We’re pleased to see an attempt to test new strategies such as this initiative, which seeds starts-ups on Main Street.  Plus we’ve seen how successful Cambridge has been with its Main Street program.  Visit downtown Cambridge next time you’re down that way and see an fine old, historic Main Street with a number of great restaurants.

Click here to go to full article on the Cecil Guardian

Towns hope that John Smith trail will lead to prosperity

Many believe trail will be avenue to land preservation, tourism and access to Bay

By Rona Kobell

For Capt. John Smith, Port Deposit in 1608 was the end of the line. But for Erika Quesenbery, the explorer’s stopping place just might mark a new beginning.

Instead of “for rent” signs on forlorn buildings downtown, she envisions shops full of historic memorabilia commemorating the captain’s epic journey through the Chesapeake Bay. On the waterfront, where a sewage treatment plant now sits, she’d like to see a pavilion for waterfront concerts, a place to rent canoes and kayaks, and open space for visitors to take in a view similar to the one Smith’s crew might have seen.

Quesenbery, who has been the unofficial historian of the town she fondly calls “Port” since moving there 10 years ago, has harbored these dreams for a long time. But now, she says, they actually seem possible.

Article Continues on Chesapeake Bay Journal

From the Watershed Chronicle —

After doing a little digging, I’ve uncovered an interesting tidbit of information about the soon-to-be new newspaper here in Cecil County, The Cecil Guardian.  The editor of this new self-billed “community newspaper that listens to your needs” will be none other than Chesapeake Bay boating icon Ira Black. (Full disclosure:  Ira gave me my first job in Publishing at The Mariner way back in 1997.)  Ira’s brand of wry, off-beat humor and straight shooting for The Mariner, then later with his self-titled Ira Black’s Nor’easter Magazine, helped make him one of the most recognizable personalities in the Chesapeake Bay boating scene over the past twenty years.

Article Continues on the Watershed Chronicle

There’s no telling what’s ahead for the upcoming season here at the top of the Chesapeake Bay.  But as old man winter gets a grip on the area and those cold blustery winds have us bundling up, we tend to place a greater emphasis on the current weather forecast. Not too long ago in Cecil County, there were only a few places to turn for the latest prediction. The daily newspaper contained an outdated forecast from the previous evening. The more popular place was the local television news broadcast, but you had to make sure you were in front of the tube at the right time. Eventually the weather channel came along to provide a steady stream of data, which was a big improvement.

But these days we have access to practically personal forecasts and massive amount of weather data on demand through a range of platforms. The best of these sites uses the web to deliver up-to-date Cecil County specific data, such as current conditions, hourly and 15-day forecasts, as well as lots of radar images and maps. The interactive radars on these web pages are highly functional and helpful when tracking that fast moving thunderstorm or watching that slow moving winter storm make its way across the county since you’re able to zoom down to your town.

It’s just one more example of how the delivery of information has changed in Cecil County. It’s free and the immediacy of the Internet lends itself to such changing information in a way that no other medium can for it streams data as fast as the values changes.

The government, the originator of practically all the data which is repackaged and resold by commercial providers, has most of its information online, but there are other places too. Here are some we find helpful for better quality local information.

http://weatherunderground.com The Weather Underground is an excellent site with plenty of information. It also has great radar capability allowing you to zoom in on portions of Cecil County. It’s our regular portal for forecasts.

http://www.intellicast.com – Great radar graphics and forecasts.

www.accuweather.com – This is the major commercial weather service and its forecasts are a strength. 

http://elktonweather.com – Ed Hoffman’s Elkton Weather page streams just about any type of local weather values one could think of. He collects the data at an observation station in the Elkton area and streams all those values live online. In addition, there are graphs plotting the change over time and lots of maps and graphs. We check this one out often too, more for its local observation’s strengths.

This Weather Underground Radar image shows a severe thunderstorm charging across the county on Aug 2, 2009