Can we talk? Some groups are ready to

I just submitted a proposal to our local Chamber’s COOL Community Task Force. Click here to learn some more information about them. A while back I posted this entry (which I’ve referenced several times recently) asking for a listing of young professional groups and traditional civic organizations in order to eventually attempt to call a meeting of their leadership. The hope is to make everyone aware of the organizations that already exist, create an information network between them and promote common themes that are driven by what they want to see in their community. I’m optimistic that organizations will want to open those lines of communication and help move this city forward. Here’s a link to a PDF of the proposal.

The hope of energizing that group of people will hopefully help to energize the business community of the Magic City. Today’s Birmingham News placed an article above the fold that focused on comments made by the CEO of Alabama Power, Charles McCrary. It is something that has been identified as being important time and time again as a key to maintaining or improving itself. Campaigns are already underway to garner more name recognition in the region, including the CVB’s “The DiverseCity” campaign and TechBirmingham’s “Change” campaign. There have also been meetings convened by Jabo Waggoner with the purpose of having the area's political leaders on the same page.

The question is not necessarily if they are on the same page, the question is how many of them are on the same page. Hopefully this will serve as a call to action among both groups to move forward and advance the city. People are definitely wanting to talk. Venues are being provided and new activities are bringing different groups together to discuss. The next step is to put these groups together and find out what they have in common.

I’d love to get comments about the proposal as well as well as thoughts about McCrary’s comments and mine. Let me know what you think.

Cheers.