I Had two back to back meetings today. The first was North Avenue Neighborhood Alliance Board of Directors. Many great things are happening. Our North Avenue Plan has moved into the process of finalizing contracts which means that we could have a final plan by this fall. Our block watch kick-off meeting went very well and I reported to the board that it looks like we have someone willing to take the lead. I am meeting with the WPD officers and MPD officers next week to start the process of merging the two business groups into an inter-city business block watch. Our Chili Fest on North Avenue is coming along too. We have a tentative date of July 24th-25th. Our chili pod will be coming from Illinois and we are getting a-oks from everyone in the city and potential sponsors so far. I hope this turns into a very successful annual event…just blocks from my house! Thanks to Meg and Mike for all their hard work on this.

I left the Alliance meeting and headed straight to City Hall for a Civic Celebration Commission meeting. Everything is coming along for this year’s Independence Day Celebration. I am excited because this year it will be on Monday July 5th which means a two day party. We got some cool news; first it looks like Bartolotta Fireworks has come up with a new and innovative launch site for the fireworks along the parkway behind Hart Park. This will solve a lot of the logistics problems we were having with the park land use and will allow us to launch larger shells which will make for a more impressive display. The other big piece of news is that we have secured the Madison Scouts Drum and Bugle Corps for the Parade. It will be nice to have a nationally recognized group to add to the mix of the great units we already have.

What a neat time to be a Tosan. I am very excited about this coming summer!!!