The regularly scheduled meeting of the Bowling Green - Warren County Bicentennial Commission held in the offices of Planning & Zoning, 1141 State Street, Bowling Green, Warren County, Kentucky, on Thursday, August 15, 1986, at 4:00 p.m.

Commissioners Present:
Mike Reynolds, Co-chair, Laura Harper Lee, Co-chair, Don Stringer, Earlene Chelf, Tommy Adams, Danny Whittle, Herbert Oldham, Ray B. Buckberry, Jr., Mayor Eldon Renaud, Romanza Johnson, Dr. Jerry Martin

Also Present:
Julie Allen, Lena Sweeten, Stan Reagan, H.B. Clark, Delaire Rowe, Charles Hardcastle

MS. HARPER LEE: Call the meeting to order. Look at the minutes Jim has given us from the last meeting. Do I hear a motion to approve the minutes?

MR. REYNOLDS: Second.

MR. OLDHAM: Second.

MS. HARPER LEE: All in favor? Approved.

MS. HARPER LEE: Treasurer's report on finances.

MR. ADAMS: I talked to several institutions trying to figure out which one would be the best as far as money market account interest rate. I called five different institutions, and they're all within a tenth of a percentage point of each other. It would be my recommendation that we open the account at First American because they have got the lowest minimum balance without a service charge.

MS. CHELF: Motion.

MR. WHITTLE: Second.

MS. HARPER LEE: All in favor? Okay, Tommy. Do that.

MS. HARPER LEE: Let's move to unfinished business, selection of committee chair persons.

MR. WHITTLE: The Committee on Committees met Monday morning and disbanded after an hour or so with the assignments. We've got four out of five. But H.B. Clark has agreed to serve as our chairman of the Program Committee.

As far as the Volunteer Personnel Committee Romanza Johnson has agreed to serve in that capacity. Dr. Jerry Martin has agreed to serve as chairman of the Research & Resources Committee. He was the first choice during our discussion Monday morning, and we do appreciate you, Dr. Martin.

Mayor Charlie Hardcastle was convinced just this afternoon to be the chairman of the Publicity & Publications Committee.

We've got committee chairmen, and they will be selecting their own full fledged committees and ready to go to work.

MS. ALLEN: Last week we talked about how a couple of these committees really need to get going, Fund Appraising and Public Relations. We need to give our chair people direction on setting up dates.

MS. HARPER LEE: Let's talk about that. I think the Program Committee should be up and running pretty fast, too. There are people talking to me about things they have in mind to do. Any ideas? Maintain the master list and send the names around to committee chairs.

MR. WHITTLE: A good starting point, Julie, Judge Buchanon volunteered to have a master calendar by today. Do we have a master calendar of everything we know that exists now?

MS. ALLEN: I have it.

MR. CLARK: But from what I understand a lot our committee will do is act as a conduit from all the various organizations and things, make sure they have an actual form filled out, something concrete for us and then recommend it to you.

MS. HARPER LEE: We talked a lot about calendar last week. We're going to put a calendar on that wall right there so that we would have something hard to look at every meeting about what had been approved. I think that it would be a good idea to do that, have it match Julie's calendar.

My idea of what your committee would do is people who want to have a program would come to your committee with that idea.

MR. CLARK: As people within the community come up with ideas and hope that there be some publicity to generate more ideas than just what happens in this room, will there be somebody like the judge's office to gather that?

MS. HARPER LEE: I think that the telephone is still with Julie, right? The telephone number for contacting someone about the Commission is with Julie. And she will take those ideas or names. And she will keep a calendar until we change that process. And we should put one on that wall so that we have access to that, too, when you come to these meetings.

MR. CLARK: We should start actually getting a name of somebody that has these projects, however we get them in here and let our committee work with somebody. Because until it gets the form filled out, all the questions answered, we all don't need to be sitting around discussing it much less all meet. Then sit and discuss and formally recommend or not recommend to the Commission.

I'm looking at maybe about ten people for the Program Committee that said they would be interested. I figured if half of us would show up we could actually get something done in a meeting and then let people work on their own. Most committee work seems to be done by people when they have time, because we won't have time to get together a lot.

One place I was wanting some guidance is as far as scheduling the items. Should I assume or should I not assume that we want to be very inclusive? Should we try to, as far as putting things on a calendar, the various minor functions or events compared to some of the major events that come up -- should we try to locate them all on a certain weekend or certain months so that we can have an emphasis? Will we have a 27 month Bicentennial calendar?

MS. HARPER LEE: That's a good question. People are going to have events and call them Bicentennial this or Bicentennial that. I think we have to decide if they are going to be, if we want to keep a record of everything that's called Bicentennial.

MR. HARDCASTLE: Are we going to have a logo?

MS. HARPER LEE: We talked about that, too. And we have a group working on a logo contest. That's what we will do as official Bicentennial projects.

My feeling about the other question is keeping a record of everything that is labeled Bicentennial event is we want to know that. Someplace I think we need a record of everything that's taking place so that we can be inclusive whether it comes before this committee or not. Is that too ambitious?

MR. BUCKBERRY: It's necessary. I don't think it's ambitious.

MR. WHITTLE: I can imagine a lot of things just saying they want to be Bicentennial and really diluting the resources that might be going toward a real significant function.

MS. HARPER LEE: On the other hand there are going to be functions like some organization is having a meeting in 97 or 98 and it's a big meeting for them. The Hobson House has an annual dinner every year. And suppose they do something in recognition of the Bicentennial. They don't really have to have approval to do that. But I think we need to know about it. It wouldn't be a Bicentennial fireworks tent.

I understand your point with that. I still think we need to have some record of the Bicentennial events that are going on. Maybe we can make a separate calendar for events that are not the ones that carry our logo.

MR. STRINGER: There are going to be a lot of events going on. Every event is not going to be a Bicentennial event. There has to be some connection between the Bicentennial and that event for us to become involved.

MR. WHITTLE: The first rule I think that a Bicentennial event ought to follow is that there be no exclusion on participation. If I had a meeting of the Bowling Green Women's Club at the Houchens Center, my guess is that everybody in town is not invited. If they wanted it to be a Bicentennial, just let them do it. Don't push it as a Bicentennial event, because my wife or my son or my gardener might want to come.

But I think that's really a first rule. If it's going to be an event it needs to have -- anybody needs to be able to attend. It may cost something. It may be a fund raising dinner at $100 a plate, but nobody is not invited.

DR. MARTIN: Are there plans to publish an official program of Bicentennial events or have any official document? If so who is going to publish it? Who is going to write it? Because in doing research, particularly historical research, you could do it superficially enough for the media and the public. But if you're going to publish something that's a little bit different -- so I think you have some thought as to what our purpose is and what we're going to end up doing with it.

MS. HARPER LEE: We haven't talked about an official publication of the Commission.

MS. ALLEN: I think that if we can get some people excited about being on these committees, the Commission is going to grow as the word spreads through the media. I can see happening from what we found other communities across the country are doing is that we set that beginning point which would go back to Mr. Buckberry to last week. We set that ending point.

Prior to that beginning point after committees have started working on what those kickoff functions are going to be, you have your Bicentennial brochure or publication. And you distribute that in the community in association with all of these kickoff events. Then that will generate more interest. People get on the band wagon all throughout next year and will generate more interest for people to come to the Commission to submit their ideas or to help give money to the Commission so the Commission can come up with its own events for the community.

I think that is very crucial, but we need to get started on what that beginning point is going to be and tie everything in to that beginning point so that from there there's this movement of energy.

MR. HARDCASTLE: It would seem to me like some type of media kickoff needs to be done relatively soon.

MR. STRINGER: We're all in agreement on that. We discussed that last meeting.

MR. REYNOLDS: I'm going to back up one more step again and officially introduce Dr. Jerry Martin. H.B. Clark, raise your hand. Charlie Hardcastle. Thank you all for agreeing to again serve as committee chairs here. The Committee on Committees really did a nice job there. We'll give you a full packet of where we've come and where we are now to help you.

MS. HARPER LEE: I think what Julie said also about the brochure is a really good idea as a research project for the Research Committee.

DR. MARTIN: Well, you can have some sort of limited program to start it off. If this is going to be an ongoing thing, we're going to have to collect material. So you may have brochures for different events. My question is at the end of the year or the two year period are we going to have a publication that will go on sale to the public if they want to keep it as a souvenir of all the materials and events and calendars and things that we've dug up and to keep in the library or in your house or wherever? Put these things in a time capsule.

That would be something that we'd have to get a committee together for, not at the beginning. This would be too much of a job and you couldn't know whether you could do that in that short period of time.

MR. BUCKBERRY: You could have a small brochure to kick that off.

DR. MARTIN: I'm just wondering at the end of all of this, are we going to get all of this material together somehow with pictures and the whole works.

MS. HARPER LEE: I think we can have a recommendation from the committee. It sounds like a good idea to me. I think we're developing the big picture.

I think right now what we need to concentrate on is the committee organizations and the people who are interested in helping gather material.

MR. CLARK: What I came in here hoping to find today and I guess we're developing; somewhere out there there's some kind of major goals and objectives of the Bicentennial Commission. Is there a big picture that I have not seen the light on yet?

MS. HARPER LEE: Right now we're developing the big picture. I think that's true of your committees.

We talked last week about a kickoff news. I think we're still planning to do that as soon as possible. That would be part of that committee's role. We didn't talk about an actual date last week.

MR. WHITTLE: We were talking about the first week of September.

MS. HARPER LEE: By that time we hope to have the committee chairs to present to the public for people to contact if they're interested in working in a certain area.

MR. BUCKBERRY: What we're really struggling for now, are there major events that we're going to pattern around? Yes. These are the major -- trying to come up with the major events. And then the doors are wide open, whatever. And we continue, all of us, to get input from different places.

An industrialist stopped me, said, "If you all come up with some kind of a luncheon or some kind of a something that you want a headline, out of town speaker," he said, "Come see me. I'm able to find that and take care of that."

We're getting this kind of thing coming in, and it's right now trying to come together, I think.

MR. CLARK: Probably the first thing we need to do is sit down with the judge's staff here and develop a good thorough conduit for information to come to. And then my committee can do things. Right now we don't have a lot of things to do with other than I've warned the people I've called we're going to meet sometime next week and decide what we're really going to do.

MR. BUCKBERRY: The Board of Realtors is very interested. "Who do we contact?" We're getting that kind of thing.

MR. HARDCASTLE: This committee is a support committee for what the other people are doing. We're not out to make news ourselves, but we report the news that you present to us.

MS. ALLEN: There's a lot of leg work that can be done now, for example, to get a Good Morning America crew here to do, "Hey. We're from Warren County, Kentucky. Good morning, America," and get some of these Southern Living in. They do things like this with small towns across the United States all the time.

DR. MARTIN: Is there going to be an official photographer? Someone needs to record the events. Who is that going to be? We need to have that in place, because some of these events are going to start immediately or soon.

MS. HARPER LEE: We haven't talked about the official photographer yet.

MR. REYNOLDS: It's amazing. We're talking about what role our committees are going to take, what they're going to do. This is so wide open that every meeting and every next person that speaks probably brings up a really nice and important idea that has not been captured or cataloged or put into a slot.

And as Ray said earlier we're fledgling, struggling for identity, for purpose, for organization for content, for everything.

The next item down our agenda today is to set a kickoff time for the Bicentennial and closeout time. We don't even have that yet. We've got a lot of things to capture. We appreciate you coming on board.

MS. HARPER LEE: Why don't we establish today a beginning date and an ending date. We had quite of bit discussion about this last time. We didn't come up with a final product.

MS. ALLEN: About the calendar, we called organizations galore about trying to get dates. And I said starting December of this year through 1998. Well, as soon as I said 1998 people started gasping, saying, "Oh, my goodness. We don't even have December planned yet or next spring planned yet."

So I included as many things as I got feedback on from these organizations in that list. I left you with a blank calendar. And why I decided to do that is because, one, all of those things on that list are not going to be associated with the Bicentennial first of all; and, two, that list will grow bigger and bigger as March gets closer and as May gets closer.

And a lot of people in this community, like I said last week, they're just waiting for us to say, "This is the Bicentennial kickoff. This is the Bicentennial three-day weekend carnival or this is the Bicentennial fund raiser." They're waiting for us to say that.

I think as long as it doesn't fall on a major community event that we already know about, I think it's fine.

MS. HARPER LEE: Okay. What about the beginning date? What do we want to use as a beginning date? We have a lot of options. We have two options, I guess.

DR. MARTIN: Seems to me that the dates would be the dates of the Bicentennial period itself.

MS. HARPER LEE: Okay. From March 1st of 97 or from December of 96?

MR. WHITTLE: The bill that was passed creating Warren out of Logan was December of 96. I think that's probably the logical starting point. I almost feel overwhelmed by the thought of all of these girl scouts and cub scouts doing Bicentennial themes for the parade between now and December the 7th.

MS. ALLEN: When I called her back we had a discussion about organizational process. This year they have planned 200 years of Christmas, and next year is going to be another related theme. They're wanting to do two years of Bicentennial stuff but have two different ways of looking at it. That's the way the Jaycee's, John, Mary Carman explained it to me. She was talking with industries then about doing it.

You have to remember that if we let the Jaycee's do it as part of their Christmas parade, it's not a lot of organizational work on our part. They have done it for so many years. They have the manpower. They can do it.

MS. HARPER LEE: That date was December the 7th.

MS. ALLEN: December 7th which is exactly the Saturday before the 14th. So that would mean that we would start our kickoff, if we tied it into the parade, the 7th and maybe have activities the week of the 7th through the 14th.

MS. HARPER LEE: The bill was signed on the 14th separating Warren from Logan County.

MR. WHITTLE: The idea of having a mock Legislature here on the 14th, even if we can only get a handful of real legislators, to read that bill aloud and do it in costume and that kind of thing; if we could get that swung and let that be an almost a day long something happening on the 14th, there may be a few things that could fill in between the 7th and the 14th to make it a full week's kickoff. The kickoff for a Bicentennial ought to be, maybe not like the opening ceremonies of the Olympics, but pretty important.

MS. ALLEN: We could tie in birthday bash, fund raising party or whatever we want to call that. The city and the county always have a Christmas open house. We could tie in our open house serving birthday cake and stuff to the public. I mean there's several themes; the Christmas open houses across the community. We can tie in other things throughout that week as well if that's what the direction the organization wants to go.

MS. HARPER LEE: Something Danny said is important, an opportunity maybe if we kick off in December for some sort of fund raising event around the end of the year. I think that's something we need to take into consideration for the Fund Raising Committee that isn't here.

MR. REYNOLDS: Kick it off around the 7th of December and tie in about a full week there or ten day period, the 7th through the 14th.

What was the closing date? Something happening in March.

MS. CHELF: That was kind of short for the city, though, to stop at March. That's only three months for their Bicentennial year.

MR. BUCKBERRY: Everything we're going to be doing is not going to be Warren County and then we're going to switch and do Bowling Green. It's going to be all together. So we'll have the Bowling Green emphasis throughout.

I don't know that it's critical, that much time. We've got to go past January 1. The city's birthday is 98.

MS. HARPER LEE: This is called the Bowling Green - Warren County Bicentennial celebration.

MAYOR RENAUD: You all are the ones to make the decision, and we know that it's done jointly. So it shouldn't be a problem. I just wondered whether it should be maybe a compact period. You have a start and ending. Maybe your events should be focussed in a much narrower space of time.

MR. BUCKBERRY: That opens the possibility of ending it on New Years Day, 98, the city's official birthday. So we're really pulling this thing down about to a year, December of 96 and final, a big blowout, whatever we do for the city.

MR. REYNOLDS: To January of 98.

MR. STRINGER: 18 months is still a long period of time.

MS. HARPER LEE: Is that a general agreement then? We're talking about December the 7th of 96 through 97. If the city is not offended, I think that's a good idea.

MS. ALLEN: Make it a certain date in 98, because 98 is important to the city. So I mean if it's whatever date in 98, at least some date in 98.

MR. REYNOLDS: Is there anything from a real historical standpoint in early 98 that would fall in there anywhere?

MR. BUCKBERRY: Let's look at that. The Research Committee may be able to tie it to something there that might be of interest.

DR. MARTIN: I think it was officially founded in March. We shouldn't stop it before the city was officially founded.

MR. WHITTLE: It was designated as the county seat of Warren County on that date. The logo of Bowling Green says incorporated 1812. So it really wasn't even incorporated for several more years. But it was a village that this Moore guy sort of established by donating land for the square even earlier than that.

MR. BUCKBERRY: Fiscal court minutes indicate Bowling Green did get that start in 98. I've always been mad at them about using 1812.

MS. HARPER LEE: Let's say then we're going to be begin December the 7th and go through an official date probably sometime like in March that we talked about generally for ending the Bicentennial celebration. We'll nail that specific date down later.

Right now I understand that Amos and Rick need to do their presentation so they can go some place else. Is that right?

MR. RICK KELLY: The Bowling Green 10K Classic this year is on September 28th. In conjunction with that we are doing a fund raising event. Each year we do some different events, silent auction, whatever. This year Mariah's is reopening the week before that. So we're tying that in with it and making that a fund raising event that would benefit the 10K Classic as well.

We always pick a second charity or second group to also benefit any of these things we do. We do the silent auction to benefit the United Way.

In discussing Mariah's ties to the founding of Bowling Green, George and Robert Moore and how it related back to the Bicentennial and the founding and Warren County, it came to our conclusion that maybe including Bicentennial celebration as helping to be a fund raising part of this would be a benefit to this group.

So basically what I had talked, I guess maybe two or three weeks ago to Mike Buchanon and had mentioned to him -- and he was receptive to it from the standpoint of the fund raising side as well as bringing some publicity and awareness to the public in terms of the Bicentennial celebration.

What we're talking about doing is a two-night event. The restaurant itself can seat about 250 to 300 people. We're talking about doing it on two different nights, September 20th and 21st. So basically we're talking about using this as the grand reopening of Mariah's and doing a dinner, drinks and entertainment program including bringing in some guest chefs from New Orleans and one from New York, the National Restaurant Association ice carving champion, doing a demonstration there and entertainment with back-to-back baby grands and just basically a low key event. We're not talking about something that goes on until the late hours of the night.

We're not talking about dancing and all that kind of stuff. We're basically talking about a low key entertainment, a little bit different kind of food than what you would normally associate with Mariah's or Bowling Green and bringing in some people with expertise.

There are couple of different levels that we've been discussing in terms of fees, and one is just a straight $100 per person, corporate table that would be work out to be $200 per person. We have sent out some initial feelers just from our corporate side of it as far as the corporate sponsorship that we go through every year. We've got a lot a good response from it. We're basing these numbers basically upon some of this preliminary response. Any cost associated with it, basically trying to end up with a net of 25 to $30,000 which would be split between the 10K and the Bicentennial Commission.

We're ready to start to go to press, to publicize it, to do invitations and whatever. I guess we want to make sure that you all are interested in being a part of it whether it conflicts with any other fund raising events that you all might have intended or scheduled down the road. But that's where we are right now. And I'll be glad to answer any questions or take any feedback.

MS. HARPER LEE: I'm pretty sure we don't have another official function to conflict. Any comments?

MR. WHITTLE: I don't think the timing could be any better. It's going to be so close. Even if we had a press conference next week, that's not out of sync.

MR. BUCKBERRY: I think Charlie's initial comment was, "Tell me something to say. I don't have anything to say yet." But if we can get out initially some dates, firm up some dates and whatever.

MR. STRINGER: Everybody is interested in the building. It would be an excellent opening.

MS. ALLEN: Mr. Kelly, he should have the first say to the public because this is his gift to the Commission. And then after he explains to the public the gift that he's going to provide the city and the county with, then we build on that and we build excitement up about this is your way to give back to the community to see this historical building that's now a part of our community getting the same kind of support, the efforts of the Commission.

MR. HARDCASTLE: Kind of a pre-Bicentennial sort of thing to give some seed money to get started.

MS. HARPER LEE: There's so much anticipation about Mariah's that that's a good focus. Everybody is waiting and watching that building. I think that's a really good thing to do.

MR. BUCKBERRY: If you want to get it on the floor for further discussion, I make a motion that be an event that we work with, whether it's an official Bicentennial participation or whatever.

MS. HARPER LEE: Pre-Bicentennial.

MR. BUCKBERRY: I move that we so recognize and cooperate in every way.

MS. CHELF: Second.

MS. HARPER LEE: All in favor.

MR. REYNOLDS: Thank you, Rick.

MS. HARPER LEE: Back to the ending date. Julie gave Mike this paragraph that says the natal date of the city is January the 2nd, 1798. So we do have that option of making it probably a year long event; which I got the feeling a minute ago a lot people thought it was a good idea stopping after a year. I think that's probably good, too. We can wear the public out with the public celebration not to mention our committee chairs.

MR. CLARK: I can explain to somebody that the Bicentennial year is 1997, but it's hard to explain the Bicentennial year is from about September of 96 to roughly May of 98.

MR. WHITTLE: It lets us get some of all three years which are significant but focuses it all in on 97. Tell us the source of what you have just presented again.

MS. HARPER LEE: The files we have says Warren County Order Book A; looks like it's from the Kentucky Building.

MS. ALLEN: It's been in our historical files. I made a copy of it.

MS. HARPER LEE: Judge John B. Rhodes, Story of Bowling Green. It's a book, Story of Bowling Green. First Presbyterian Church.

MR. BUCKBERRY: John Rhodes said that's what it is. Everybody sort of said, "Yes, sir; judge."

MR. REYNOLDS: Let me read the whole paragraph. "In the March term of 1798 when the courthouse was first occupied, the name of the city was bestowed and was ordered to be called Bowling Green. January 2, 1798, must be declared to be the natal date."

So in March of 1798 they set our birthday back on January 2nd.

MR. BUCKBERRY: Judge Rhodes said January 2nd is the birthday and the other date is the christening date. That's the way he put it when he used to give that lecture.

DR. MARTIN: I'll try to get the official version of this. But I think we ought to leave that sort of open-ended. I really don't think we ought to shut it off before the birthday actually occurred, whichever date it is.

MR. WHITTLE: Jerry's committee needs to look into that and give us a report next Thursday on a good resolution of the ending date.

MR. REYNOLDS: We need to have the press conference the first week of September.

MR. REAGAN: Our first news conference could center around the introduction of the Bicentennial theme and logo. And then if there are calendar events that we'd like to discuss, we can discuss main events.

MS. HARPER LEE: We've talked about kickoff celebrations. We have talked about December the 7th as the Jaycee parade. We talked about December the 14th.

MR. WHITTLE: On the 14th of December I would like to see a fireworks display in the city's industrial landfill between the College and State Street bridges. And I would like to see the College Street bridge that's been restored and made a pedestrian way up with chairs for reserved $10 a seat seating for the fireworks display. I'd like to see the State Street bridge closed off and made observation space for the rest of the masses who can't and don't want to pay $10 a seat to see the fireworks display.

We can have a big fireworks display in what will one day be a city park, Riverside Park, shooting there. And from both of those bridges you'll be able to see a fantastic fireworks display on that night of the 14th, the day of the declaration or passing the bill creating Warren County.

What it sort of does for us is reclaim a little bit of that part of town especially between Fourth and Third and Second Street where we're all afraid to go. And we could symbolically reclaim a piece of our heritage right there. Barren River is a good location.

MS. HARPER LEE: The logo contest.

MS. CHELF: There really isn't much to report. Julie and I were talking and knowing time is drawing short and that maybe we might be able to help that committee a little bit, she and I sat down. Julie and I came up with a few guidelines. I wrote down some things. I also talked to a couple of graphic designers. We have a few ideas of what the logo contest might look like. We though we'd hand that to you tonight maybe just to help you out a little bit.

Julie also has developed a list of places, organizations or individuals where the contest rules might be sent to get participation.

MR. HARDCASTLE: Are you thinking more about having school children do it?

MS. CHELF: I don't think that has been decided. In talking to a couple of graphic designers at Western, they said to get quick turnaround time it would probably be best to involve the professional designers.

MAYOR RENAUD: I would agree with that. I think the flag the city has right now was designed by a grade school student. It looks like it. I have been embarrassed about that flag for a long time. So I'd like to see a professional do this. Are you talking about one logo for the Bowling Green Warren County Bicentennial, one logo for both? Are you thinking that would also appear on a flag, two different flags?

MS. CHELF: One for the city and one for the county?

MAYOR RENAUD: That's the way we were working on it up until now.

MS. ALLEN: It's not a city or county flag or city or county logo. It's a Bicentennial Commission one. So it would only have temporary use and after that have the historical perspective.

MR. BUCKBERRY: Tell the professional designer we want a joint logo for this, and we'd like for you to do it so that it's divisible. And after the Bicentennial leave it one for the city and one for the county.

MS. HARPER LEE: Okay. Film project. I told you last week I had just gotten this proposal from Elaine and Dorian Walker for what they would like to venture and ask the Fund Raising Committee to help them do as a film project for celebration. And they made copies for everybody.

I'll report to them what we decide to do. I will let them know when the Fund Raising Committee is established, and they can contact them.

New business.

MR. WHITTLE: I have one thing that I wanted to bring up. In the research that I've been glued to on the computer every night following the Net and other Bicentennial celebrations, what I find is almost everyone has selected some kind of legacy project.

And it's sort of like Rick Kelly was talking about with Mariah's. When they do something with the 10K as a fund raiser, that's a legacy for some other charity or organization or something.

I can foresee that this Bicentennial may result in some targeted leftover funds. It may be that we need to think seriously about what would be the legacy of this Bicentennial year? And can we realistically expect to see something that could be lasting that could have some impact until 2096?

And I wanted to throw that out. I don't have -- you know, the Whittle family trust would be good. But some legacy event or organization or capital project or something might benefit from this whole year's celebration.

MAYOR RENAUD: I keep thinking about an ampitheater, someplace so that we could have concerts. We have the Bowling Green Warren County Concert Band now. I'm trying to get them to change their name to the Bicentennial Band. They really just got started. I would like some location where we could go to listen to music. We really don't have anything like that in an outdoor setting.

MS. HARPER LEE: That's been an idea that's come up several times. And a lot of people are really interested in that. That's something that will be a lasting contribution to the community.

MR. BUCKBERRY: To pick up on Dr. Martin's good point about some kind of photography on this, some photographers may be able to fill in and do something that clearly needs done. As Mr. Dale has so gratuitously given us the use of his court reporting skills, do you think the Southern Kentucky Photography Group might be willing to commit to the Commission that it would make photographers available upon request for certain events, certain publicity?

DR. MARTIN: I'll ask.

MR. BUCKBERRY: It might be that they would let that be a part of their contribution; that when photographers are needed by Charles or by an event or some reporting that one of their members might be able to come. Surely we can defer the expense of film and processing for them.

MAYOR RENAUD: Don Myrtle, I have talked to him. That is something that they want to do. I found out recently I think he's going to retire. I don't know where he's going to move to. But the others are still interested. There's many professional photographers in there.

I don't know how many people are aware of this. The property there right across from the old, from the courthouse that the drugstore burned, that property looks as though it's going to become county property shortly. Mr. Hancock said that he would give that property to the county and to the city -- to the county. Everybody knows the history. Smile about that one.

And so I talked to Judge Buchanon. There is an exclusion there against making it a parking lot. Why don't we make that the Veterans' Bicentennial Park. November 9th we're having a big Veterans' Day parade this year. And we expect maybe a thousand people there, maybe three military bands and a lot of community involvement. And if we could we'd have a flag and dedication on that day.

We have that big wall that looks terrible. After it burned I think Mike Caudill, who owns the building next to it, tried putting some paint on it. It didn't work. Well, I wonder if we could do something other than paint and have some mural put on there somehow that will last; not something that's going to be gone in a year but right in front of our park then. And that would have a Bicentennial theme to it, something that would last.

MR. CLARK: I'm kind of seeing the big picture. It's not there and won't be painted until 98, January, March, one of those dates.

DR. MARTIN: What about the Capitol Arts? Are they going to do anything in conjunction with this theme?

MS. ALLEN: I sit on their board. And actually I brought it up. I just started July 1st on the board, and I brought it up at the first board meeting; that I felt like the Capitol Arts should take on a project and tie in with the Bicentennial.

And there was a lot of interest. It's up for discussion. Our next board meeting is next week again. So they are reviewing it. There's a very big interest to do something to leave the community with.

MR. STRINGER: I believe we should go ahead with the press release announcing appointment of our chairs and cochair.

MR. REYNOLDS: Laura, good meeting today. Next meeting is next Thursday at 4:00.

MS. HARPER LEE: We're adjourned.