By Muriel Eason
Special to The SUN
The monthly meeting of the “Imagine Downtown” group will be held at 6 p.m. on Thursday, March 28, at the Ross Aragon Community Center in the South Conference Room.
The purpose of the group is to put into action Downtown Colorado, Inc.’s (DCI) recommendations to revitalize our downtown — the heart of our community. On the agenda for this meeting:
1. The final report written from Downtown Colorado Inc. This report can be viewed on the CDC website at www.pagosaspringscdc.org/downtown-colorado-inc/. The DCI team also sent a list of action items and priorities for the next 24 months. DCI is familiar with how best to roll out these plans, so their guidance and suggestions are very welcome. This can also be viewed in the same location.
2. A progress report on action items from each of two groups involved in moving these efforts forward.
3. A decision regarding initiatives to engage next in order to gather momentum and keep moving ahead.
4. A presentation regarding Pagosa Time Bank. You can find out more at http://pagosatimebank.com/. A time bank is a nonmonetary system based on the amount of time people contribute to helping others. An hour of time from one person is worth an hour of time from another, regardless of the service contributed. It enables those with skills and experience to do work for another, and then receive an hour’s worth of time from someone else with a different skill. The main benefits to time banking are being able to get to know and trust the people doing the work and being able to obtain services that otherwise would have been unaffordable. Time banking places equal value on the abilities of all participants. This helps rebuild the ties that keep our community together and allows everybody to participate in our community’s upkeep and improvement. It creates a new “extended family” that bridges race, class, gender, ethnicity and national origin in an exciting way. There are 300 registered time banks in the U.S. with a total of 30,000 members. There are an additional 30,000 members in the UK and another 100,000 members in 34 other countries. Time banking is a simple, yet powerful way to weather tough times while strengthening a local economy.
Everyone is invited to attend.
