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Wellington, Kan. —
As many wonder what will become of Wellington's historic downtown, a campaign officially kicked off last night, hoping to shed some light on the situation.
After listening to ideas from the public during a March 2011 meeting concerning the future of downtown, the Light Up Wellington Committee was formed in hopes of bringing one of those ideas to fruition- lining downtown buildings with lights.
The Light Up Wellington Committee hosted an informational meeting Wednesday evening, Jan. 11 at the Memorial Auditorium. The committee is made up of Wellington Area Chamber of Commerce Director, Shelley Hansel-Williams, Chamber Board Member, Sunni Bales, Wellington City Manager, Gus Collins, and City of Wellington Electric Distribution Supervisor, Cliff Zens. They talked about their plans, what it would take, and the next steps in moving forward.
They presented a plan for approximately 4500 feet of LED lights that would outline downtown buildings. In the proposal, light strands would go along segments of Washington Ave., Harvey Ave., and Lincoln Ave. Before plans can move forward, each building owner must sign a release form allowing lights to be put on their building.
"Sunni and I went around and talked to many...building owners and business owners to see if there was some interest or if we should continue this," said Hansel-Williams. "Most of the feedback, if not all of the feedback was fairly positive, of course there's a lot of questions." Without the signed release forms, and funding, the project is at a standstill.
"Just to do this area, if we could raise about $15,000, we would have enough in supplies, and probably just a little bit extra for some back up supplies," said Hansel-Williams.
At the meeting, the group presented a green, plastic strand of lights, the kind currently outlining the building at 201 N. Washington. Zens has been doing research on the technical aspects of the lighting idea, he said there is another option he found from an outlet in Tonkawa, Okla.
"They recommended the nylon lights, if we leave them up all year long- the greener, plastic ones will last about three or four years," Zens said, the nylon type would last about eight to 10 years. He also said that powering the lights could be done via existing street polls as LED lights don't require a heavy electrical load. He added, one outlet can power an entire block and it would cost less than six dollars a month to power all of the lights in their proposal, a cost picked up by the City.
As many wonder what will become of Wellington's historic downtown, a campaign officially kicked off last night, hoping to shed some light on the situation.
After listening to ideas from the public during a March 2011 meeting concerning the future of downtown, the Light Up Wellington Committee was formed in hopes of bringing one of those ideas to fruition- lining downtown buildings with lights.
The Light Up Wellington Committee hosted an informational meeting Wednesday evening, Jan. 11 at the Memorial Auditorium. The committee is made up of Wellington Area Chamber of Commerce Director, Shelley Hansel-Williams, Chamber Board Member, Sunni Bales, Wellington City Manager, Gus Collins, and City of Wellington Electric Distribution Supervisor, Cliff Zens. They talked about their plans, what it would take, and the next steps in moving forward.
They presented a plan for approximately 4500 feet of LED lights that would outline downtown buildings. In the proposal, light strands would go along segments of Washington Ave., Harvey Ave., and Lincoln Ave. Before plans can move forward, each building owner must sign a release form allowing lights to be put on their building.
"Sunni and I went around and talked to many...building owners and business owners to see if there was some interest or if we should continue this," said Hansel-Williams. "Most of the feedback, if not all of the feedback was fairly positive, of course there's a lot of questions." Without the signed release forms, and funding, the project is at a standstill.
"Just to do this area, if we could raise about $15,000, we would have enough in supplies, and probably just a little bit extra for some back up supplies," said Hansel-Williams.
At the meeting, the group presented a green, plastic strand of lights, the kind currently outlining the building at 201 N. Washington. Zens has been doing research on the technical aspects of the lighting idea, he said there is another option he found from an outlet in Tonkawa, Okla.
"They recommended the nylon lights, if we leave them up all year long- the greener, plastic ones will last about three or four years," Zens said, the nylon type would last about eight to 10 years. He also said that powering the lights could be done via existing street polls as LED lights don't require a heavy electrical load. He added, one outlet can power an entire block and it would cost less than six dollars a month to power all of the lights in their proposal, a cost picked up by the City.
"The City is contributing probably the most to this," said Hansel-Williams. "They are going to do the labor, installation, the whole nine yards." The City has approved the use of it's resources.
"This is probably going to tie up Cliff's crews for a five to six week period," Collins said. "So it's quite an undertaking." The way in which the lights will be mounted to the buildings was also a topic of discussion at the meeting.
"We're going to be screwing into your buildings, folks," Collins pointed out. "Glue was an option, but everybody we talked to, the other cities that we talked to say it doesn't last."
Breaking down the cost, it will be about $3.57 per foot for the lights. Hansel-Williams said numerous building owners have asked how they can contribute. The committee landed on a suggested, building owner donation of $1 per foot for their building. The average length of downtown buildings is approximately 25 feet.
"We've got building owners wanting to contribute," she said. "So we're trying to think of what would be a fair amount [for a suggested donation]." Hansel-Williams added that the downtown decorations currently leave a lot to be desired, and the drive to light up Wellington needs to be a grass-roots effort.
"We are truly hoping our citizens will see that this is a great community project to get involved in and contribute money," she said. "I don't expect the entire burden of this to fall on our building owners, our business owners, or the City." The lights could be turned on for anything at anytime, and most definitely for local festivals and celebrations.
"I would love to be able to have by this Spring enough money raised, and have the lights ordered, and have them up by Wheat Festival," Hansel-Williams said. "That is truly an ambitious timeline." Anyone who would like to donate to the Light Up Wellington effort can send donations to:
Wellington Community Foundation
c/o Marlene Flickinger
711 N. Poplar
Wellington, Kan. 67152
Donations are tax deductible. For more information contact the Wellington Area Chamber of Commerce, and/or The City of Wellington.
"We'd talked about how nice it would be to have them ready by the Wheat Festival, but we don't even have funds yet," added Bales. "Until we actually do, and have those releases back and have everybody bought in, we really can't move forward."
