Dan Hoffman 0:12

Hello, and welcome to another edition of the RAs Review. I'm the city manager, Dan Hoffman. And with me is Sarah Fry, the public information officer for the City of Winchester.

Sarah Frey 0:20

Hi Dan. Hi everybody. Hello.

Dan Hoffman 0:23

So. Fall's kind of getting here.

Sarah Frey 0:26

Oh, so

Dan Hoffman 0:26

crisp in the mornings back. So crisp in the mornings. It's uh, it's quite lovely. One of the best times of the year in Winchester for sure. Uh, today we're gonna talk to Brady CLN from Friends of Old Town about a lot of the different stuff that's happening down on the Walking Mall. Uh, over the holidays you're gonna learn a little bit more about Foot or Friends of Old Town. Uh, so he'll be on in just a little bit tomorrow night. Council, it's, uh. Very different agenda than last time. Last time we had not, you mean

Sarah Frey 0:57

there is an agenda? There

Dan Hoffman 0:58

is an agenda this time, that last time we had just a couple of informational items in a work session. Really, uh, this time we're kind of back to business. Um, a lot of different topics. You, a lot of'em are kind of smaller land use issues. So although the agenda might look a little bit long, um, I think the biggest things that'll generate probably some discussion is the. Uh, win Ready Fares, win Tran Win Ready Fares, uh, are gonna be discussed. That was discussed last week in finance and it'll get discussed tomorrow at council. This is something council had directed us to go back and, and consider. So that is, uh, that'll probably be one of the, one of the bigger topics of discussion. I don't think, uh, there's some other stuff coming down the pipe that'll probably. Generate a fair amount of discussion in later September, but I, I think the biggest thing is, um, win ready win trend fares, uh, tomorrow. So come on out, say your piece. I know, uh, no one wants to pay more for something. Um, and, you know, we do our best to keep the rates, particularly low council's, you know, stated goal is to try to make win ready, win train more self-sufficient. Um, which is good. We operate really with a fairly huge subsidy from the feds, but the, uh, but the city contributes a lot to that to keep the rides low, so they'll be considering an increase in rates. Um, not sure when they'll go into effect. There was some discussion at the committee meeting last week. They might go into effect in November or July 1st. So I think they're leaning towards July 1st, uh, just to give everybody proper notice and we can factor it into next year's budget. So that is council tomorrow. Um, like I said, like. It's a great time to be in Winchester. Come check out downtown and we're gonna take a quick break and then we're gonna talk to Brady about some of the stuff that's happening there.

Sarah Frey 3:09

Neighborhood nights are back, well, they're almost over, but we wanna bring City Hall and everybody who makes Winchester amazing out to you in our communities and our neighborhoods. So join us at our public safety neighborhood night where we're hosting tons of fun on Friday, September 12th. Starting at 5:00 PM at Park Place Park, which is right off Harvest Drive, right there in the middle of the Harvest Ridge subdivision. Yes, we're gonna have Winchester Fire and rescues, fire trucks, and ambulance. We're gonna be doing some hands-on CPR training. You can meet the Winchester Police Department SWAT team, see a demonstration from some of their canine units. Try on firefighter gear. All kinds of really cool stuff. And in addition to that, we're also gonna have games, some free food. Our community partners are gonna be out there. You can learn all about the city services and what we try to bring into our community. And we're gonna end it with a very special screening of the movie Dog Man Under the Stars.

Dan Hoffman 4:06

No, I'm not familiar with Dog Man. Oh, uh. But you have kids younger than mine. Oh, my kids

Sarah Frey 4:12

are obsessed.

Dan Hoffman 4:13

Really? This is Dog Man's a

Sarah Frey 4:14

big thing. This is a book turned movie.

Dan Hoffman 4:16

Oh, yes. Yes.

Sarah Frey 4:17

From the same author of Captain Underpants.

Dan Hoffman 4:21

Oh, I remember that. That was my kid's era.

Sarah Frey 4:22

Yeah. So Dog Man is about a police officer. Mm-hmm. And a dog who get into an accident and they can't save them separately so they can bind them to create Dog Man.

Dan Hoffman 4:32

Dog man. Oh. So that's a very appropriate movie for public safety. Neighborhood night,

Sarah Frey 4:38

we tried to theme this very appropriately. You

Dan Hoffman 4:40

did it very well. And honestly, if your kid isn't into like police, SWAT teams, canine demonstrations, firefighting gear, you know, seeing fire trucks, you may have an alien for a child.

Sarah Frey 4:52

Yeah, I was gonna say, I, it doesn't compute with me, but I've also got three little boys, so.

Dan Hoffman 4:55

There you go. There you go. So, uh, th this, this is gonna be a fun one. Don't miss it. September 12th, 5:00 PM Park. Place. Park, park. Place. Park. It's right over there. I think it's right off Harvest, drive, harvest and beehive. Yeah. It's in the middle of a neighborhood, so if you're not in that neighborhood, you might wanna look it up, but, uh, it's a very nice park, even if it's a great park. And if you have not experienced that park, uh, yet, it's a good time to check it out too.

Sarah Frey 5:19

Absolutely. And then last, but certainly not least. We are still planning out our five year strategic plan. Yep. And we need your help.

Dan Hoffman 5:28

Yep.

Sarah Frey 5:29

This is your last chance to kind of take our community survey. We're partnering with ETC Institute. You may have received it in your mailbox. You've probably seen a targeted due on social media. So please go ahead, take the survey, tell us what you think. You can also find it@winchestersurvey.org. And don't forget that every resident who submits a survey will be entered into a raffle by ET Cs. Institute for a$500 Visa gift card?

Dan Hoffman 5:55

Yes. This is a, this is the single most important input to the strap plan. Yes, I can, I can safely say because it is direct community feedback about how we're doing in certain areas. So take the time, fill it out. Uh, it will. Definitely weigh heavily when we're looking at what we should be focusing on in the next five years. Do, do we need to improve in a particular area? Is there an area of strength that we need to capitalize on? The, these types of, this type of information is, uh, incredibly valuable as the city council puts together their Strat strategic plan for the next five years. So, uh, make sure your voice is heard, fill out the survey and, uh. In a moment, we're gonna bring, uh, bring in Brady Cloven, friends of Old Town to Corin. Hello Reuben. Welcome back. I've got a new, a new guest.

Sarah Frey 7:02

Uh, no, not a new guest.

Dan Hoffman 7:03

Not a new guest. When did we talk to Brady before

Sarah Frey 7:06

when he didn't even know what friends of Old Town was?

Dan Hoffman 7:09

Really?

Brady Cloven 7:10

Yep. Did we not have a name like yet? No, there was no website. There was no name. There was a very convoluted email address that I gave you all. Um, but yeah, we were in kinda like the early stages of me getting hired. Wow. I think it was like the first six weeks. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Okay.

Dan Hoffman 7:25

Well

Everyone 7:26

in case

Dan Hoffman 7:27

you were like me and you totally forgot, uh, welcome us back to, to the show Brady cln, uh, the executive Director of Friends of Old Town or Foot as they are. Uh. Affectionately referred to sometimes. Yeah. We love an acronym in the government. Uh, and now for those of those of you that maybe forgot, uh, Brady, start off, tell us what Friends of Old Town is.

Brady Cloven 7:51

Yeah, I'll give you an update real quick. Dan. Thank you. Because a lot has history. You forgot so much Has changed. A lot has changed. Uh, a lot has changed. So yeah, when I was on last time, um, I had just gotten hired the Main Street program. Um, we're still in early stages, I would say, but you know. Very early back then. Um, but since then we have, um, officially, uh, changed our branding and our name to be friends of Old Town. Um, it's still the Main Street program, but you know, with, uh, whatever your SEOs are for, when you look up Main Street in Winchester, you get like five different things. Yeah. Um, and we really wanted to capture this community. Feeling and energy and showed that, hey, you know, like this is something that's community driven, community wide, so let's be friends of Old Town. Um, with that came a new website, uh, that has a directory on there. People and businesses can submit their community events. Um, it's really supposed to be your OneStop shop. Yeah. Um, plus social media now, which we all worked through this past year, to be like, all right, well, who's doing what? What is the city sharing? What is the EDA sharing? What are we sharing? Um. And I think that we've pretty much gotten to a point where it's almost like passing a baton, you know, like a relay race where like we're such a small part of Winchester, we're just old town proper, and that we hand it off to the EDA and the EDA, hands it off to the city. So I think we're getting everybody that we should be. Um, but with that also came a grant funded master plan project. Mm-hmm. So we had this 20 year master plan, um, that is really to, um, help us as an organization, uh, figure out what projects we're gonna pursue over the next 20 years. Um, and we did a ton of community engagement with this. I mean, we had six or seven different focus groups of the restaurants, downtown Agritourism, um, public arts groups. And then we also had a community wide survey that got over. A thousand results and responses. Mm-hmm. Which I'm sure, as you two know, is Yeah. Uh, very hard to get some survey results. Mm-hmm. Yeah, of course. But we wanted, again, this to be something where it wasn't me coming in saying, well, this is what I wanna do in Old Town, and the board saying, this is what we think should happen. Yeah. But really what the community think should be here. Yeah. Um, and of course you're gonna get things that are like, um, you know, we need more public bathrooms, um, or we need, you know, more stoplights. And it's like, all right, well that's not really what we do. Yeah. Um, but out of that. Came a lot of good ideas and one of them actually is, um, a grant that we just received for the Taylor Pavilion mm-hmm. Project. Mm-hmm. Yep. So it's, um, gonna be called the Taylor Pavilion Revitalization, and it's a two year project, but really what it is, is to first year bump out a permanent stage extension, put a canopy over the stage that matches the current pavilion. Mm-hmm. Have some string lighting down there. Yeah. Um, so you'll do things like increasing some lighting and public safety, but also making it. One, a really great outdoor performance space. Mm-hmm. Um, but two, an everyday space that people can go to with their kids, with their families. Um, you can still bring your dogs and, and pets, but there's gonna be less room, um, you know, for them to use the bathroom on, which will be nice. Mm-hmm. Uh, but you know, this was something that. When we did that community plan that the community said, Hey, this is one thing that we really wanna see happen. And by going after this grant from the state, um, we didn't have to ask the city to reach into general funding. Mm-hmm. And so don't have to raise taxes, which is always nice for that. Right.

Dan Hoffman 10:55

Al always nice. And I will, I will say that, you know, you've been. About a year, a little over a year now on the job. Yeah, about a year and three months. Year and three months on the job. And you're right, when we first started talking about it, we weren't, nobody was really sure where it was gonna go. Oh, it's a new Main Street program. And you know, I know you've got a, a huge staff of people that work for you. Right, right, right. It's just him. Uh, and get, so when you, when you're a team of one, and obviously you've got a lot of board support too. Yeah. But when you're a team of one, getting the right person for that job is incredibly crucial. I, I know everybody is very thankful that we found you because, uh, it has been a, a pleasure to work with you. And b, there's stuff happening. You're proactive and I, I think you've already. Shown the value of this investment. So, uh, we are very, we're very happy to have you around. Um, now a lot of what you do is events. You started mentioning Taylor Pavilion. Uh, tell us about some of the stuff that's coming up this holiday season in Old Town, because from now on, folks, if you wanna know what's happening in Old Town, you need to be a friend. Whole town. Yep. Or a foot. Or a foot. Yep.

Brady Cloven 12:15

You can be a foot. Yep. Um, yeah, I mean, holiday season, it's kind of crazy that we're already here talking about it. Oh yeah. I know this last quarter of the year, but, um, we have some exciting things planned. So, you know, we have your, your annual events that happen. Um, September is gonna be a, a huge, hugely busy month. I think there's something, something every weekend. Um, but. Getting into the holidays, so I'll, I'll come back to September. But really where it kicks off for us is Hallow Winchester, which is October 25th. That's the mall wide trick or treat where the merchants have candy, they pass out. We're also gonna have Taylor Pavilion set up with tables that have mini pumpkin painting. Um, I really don't wanna give children knives on the mall. We appreciate that. So I think, yeah, um, I think painting, uh, pumpkins will go over a lot easier and we'll get some of the public arts groups like the Typewriter, studio, Chen Arts 10 top to get out there and, and you know, quote unquote sponsor it, but just be there to talk about what they're doing.

Everyone 13:04

Yeah.

Brady Cloven 13:05

Um, and then that night will be the, uh, brewery crawl. The Hella Winchester Brewery crawl that will cap at, um, broken window with their stage and music and mm-hmm. Um, costume contest. Each brewery is gonna have their own theme inside their place, and then they'll be voted on by the public to say who has the best one. So the overall theme is kind of alien invasion. Okay. Um, and then breweries can do what they want with that. So. Cool. It should be fun. Um, and we should have that posted. Next couple weeks here. Awesome. Um, and then we have Independent Weekend, which is Small Business Weekend, which is like your Plaid Friday. Mm-hmm. Right after Thanksgiving, small business Saturday. Uh, with that we're developing a shopping guide and some really fun. Activities like some retail bingo with some giveaways and, um, I think that's gonna be really fun. Um, as you two know, the holiday season is arguably the busiest, you know, biggest sales time for the businesses on the mall. Absolutely. And it's, you know, as long as they're successful, they can kind of, um, sail through the slow months of January and February.

Everyone 14:03

Yeah.

Brady Cloven 14:04

Um, so. Friends of Old Town, we really want to do things that are gonna help boost that up.

Everyone 14:08

Yeah.

Brady Cloven 14:08

Um, and drive even more business down here through the entire holiday season. Yeah.

Dan Hoffman 14:12

And it is one of the, you know, one of the things that's always struck me about the walking mall is that there I would love a little more retail, but we don't have any like, big chains. No. We don't have, uh. A department store or, or something like that on the mall, per se, anymore. There's no, it's, it's not an Old Navy. Yeah. There's no gap there. Yeah. You know, there's no, there's no I, you know, apple store or anything like that. But what you get is a pretty cool, unique collection of, of things, of stuff you can buy, whether it's the, the jeweler. Uh, the silversmith guy and his hours of operations, if you catch him at the right time. Mm-hmm. You get the hand works folks. You've got experiences you can give at polka dot, and I'm sure there's more the escape

Sarah Frey 15:02

room. The escape

Dan Hoffman 15:03

room, yeah. Let's not forget about the escape room too.

Brady Cloven 15:05

There's a lot of personality and character with what we have here, and I mean, with over 200 businesses on the mall. Yeah. Um, and the primary secondary district, you know, the makeup of that is we have a lot of professional services. Sure. Your accountants, your lawyers. Um, but we have, you know, between 30, 34 restaurants right now. Um, and then we have about 33 retailers. Mm-hmm. And like you said, you don't have kind of this big box department store. Yeah. But. I think especially with Plaid Friday, you can present it as this, um, one-stop shop. Yeah.

Everyone 15:36

Mm-hmm.

Brady Cloven 15:36

So you can say, Hey, you know, um, here's a bingo card to say, uh, you know, come shop for your cousin, come shop for your grandparents, come shop for your significant other, and you can go to different shops that do that because there is something here for everyone. Yeah. Um, and then that will launch us into Winter Village, which is, I think it's fourth year now. Um, last year I was a casual observer. Um, this year I am, um, me and my large staff are taking on more of a role with it. Um, but that's a huge shopping time for Old Town and that's, you know, turning the mall into this European style winter Village. Oh yeah. Um, there's gonna be a kid zone, there's gonna be a horse-drawn carriage. Um, and then we'll have a ton of vendors on the mall, um, trying to get some food, um, specials put together too with like, need bread. Oh, yeah. So that should be a fun time. That was fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. And then there's two weekends between that and actual Christmas, so we're planning to do a cookie crawl. Mm-hmm. Which is like a, a shop and crawl for the merchants. Nice. But everybody has a special cookie. Um, just really getting people into stores, man. It's, it's, it should be a good time.

Dan Hoffman 16:36

Yeah. Yeah. And you mentioned the secondary district. A lot of folks that's. Still part of the territory. Mm-hmm. Right. So there's the mall, of course, which we all know, but then there's a kinda that outer loop, especially on the, I guess it would be the west side of the mall. You get Scarpa. Mm-hmm. Scarpa Alta, which is, um, I, Sarah knows it well. Very dangerous. The best

Sarah Frey 16:59

Black Friday, Salem Winchester.

Dan Hoffman 17:01

Oh yeah. Yep. We've got one of the best independent bookstores. Yes, you do. Ever. If I can't think of one that's much better than,

Sarah Frey 17:09

Nope.

Dan Hoffman 17:09

Book gallery and, uh, you know, kind of just again, just off the walking mall though. But you got Kimberly's too. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Always a perfect spot. If you need, like, especially if you have no idea what you're gonna get. Somebody, you got the men's store downstairs. There's just a lot options. We can build

Sarah Frey 17:25

you a basket. Yes. They'll seem a basket for Yes. Oh, they're fabulous.

Dan Hoffman 17:28

For lazy holiday shoppers like myself, it is definitely the way to go.

Brady Cloven 17:33

Well, even with that secondary district now on Braddock, uh, we're getting a new restaurant, uh, September 16th. It's gonna be sojo. Which is going into the old LAIs.

Everyone 17:41

Yeah. Yeah. French Place. It's gone now. It's

Brady Cloven 17:44

September 16th. They're opening up and they're, um, I mean they're a great couple, Martha and Felix, so they also have the food trucks, Roman Bistro. Mm-hmm. And I believe it's three fires, pizza. Oh, okay. Okay. Um, but it's going to be a Mediterranean, south African, um, place. And I took a walk through the other day and man, it looks, it looks great. Great in there. I walked past there and p

Dan Hoffman 18:04

poked my head in.

Brady Cloven 18:05

Yeah.

Dan Hoffman 18:06

And yeah, it, it's looking great. And then of course. We got another new one. Fuego. I've been there a few times already.

Brady Cloven 18:14

Fantastic, man. That's so good. Yeah, it's dangerous. I take a lot of work lunches there. Yeah. People are like, where should we go? I'm like, Fuego. Of course. Of course. Fuego. Yeah.

Dan Hoffman 18:21

So tons of stuff. On the walking mall. Uh, but there's also some projects going on. Mm-hmm. Uh, tell us about the history of US Project.

Brady Cloven 18:29

So this was something that we had thought of pretty early on, which is to connect the entire primary secondary district. So, like you said, the mall is kind of what everybody navigates towards. That's what you think of when you think of kind of old town. But there's so much happening in that secondary district. So Piccadilly came up really quickly over the last few years, and that's where Scarpa is. But you also have the cider house over there, Paladin. Um, so things are really coming up. Same with Cork Streep. Um, but I don't know that there's a lot of things that are. Intentionally moving people in and out of the districts.

Everyone 19:01

Yeah.

Brady Cloven 19:02

Um, so History of US is a self-guided virtual tour that you can scan a QR code that is on a nice sticker on the front of a building and it'll take you through the entire history of that building and not just the building, but the ownership in between.

Everyone 19:15

Yeah.

Brady Cloven 19:16

So, for instance, you can go to Murphy's Beverage and scan it and you can see what that building was back in the early 19 hundreds. That's very cool. Mm-hmm. Um, you can learn about the ownership, how it, how it moved across, and, and then also you see pictures of like, elephants on the mall. Did you guys know that elephants were on Loudoun Street Mall? No. Yeah, like back in the, the late 19th century, they would have parades and like, it's just, it's really fun. We have a, a great group of volunteers, um, and we have 11. Different buildings now with five more on the way. And people we've talked to, they love it because it's, there's not like you have to wait for a certain tour guide to get there. It's, you just scan and go and it takes you through Old Town forever. And a, a lot of

Dan Hoffman 19:53

these buildings, you can tell they were something else at one point. Mm-hmm. Like Murphy's beverage, Murphy Beverage, for example. Uh, first off, if you go in there and talk to Heidi, she's gonna get you exactly what you need. Yeah. Just yes, just trust. Trust in Heidi. Mm-hmm. Uh. But when you're looking around, you're like, well, this clearly wasn't always a wine store. What was this? Either there's some old mosaic tile that's still hanging around or something peculiar about the facade, and you're like, what was that? At one point, like, I hope at some point we get where Blue Peacock is, is that you never know. I they, they, that, by the way, also is a very dangerous place and a perfect place if you want a unique gift. Yes. You go to Blue Peacock. Yeah.

Brady Cloven 20:35

Yep. I got all my Christmas gifts there last year. Yep. So. Yeah, I can attest to that. No, I mean, I, I, I don't wanna give away who's on there'cause it is kind of fun to Oh, okay. Just announce at the end. But I will say that there are some very. Interesting ones on the next quarter, um, that you wouldn't necessarily think would be on a tour like this. Yeah. Um, and then there's a ton of information. Like, I mean, even we just did the wine room at Taylor Pavilion. Mm-hmm. Um, and their sticker actually covers everything of the, the pavilion of the Taylor Hotel that was there, what it used to be. So their sticker actually has some bonus stuff. The roof collapsing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, maybe not all that, but you know, some other fun stuff.

Dan Hoffman 21:12

Well, I mean, there, there's a lot of interesting stories on the Walkie Mall. I mean, the one that. You know, it's 1 37 South, loud and the one at the south end of the mall that burned mm-hmm. Burned out 5, 6, 5, 6 years ago. No, actually it was before me. So it's probably going on six, seven years. Uh, which by the way, everybody, things are slowly but surely moving along there. Um, but that building has a very unique history to it. Uh, the. Furniture place.

Sarah Frey 21:43

Patents. Mm-hmm.

Dan Hoffman 21:44

Patents. Thank you so much. Uh, patents interesting. His history to that. Yep. The old, uh, I mean the shoe store, there's just a lot. Water Street. Oh, village Square. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Of course. Mm-hmm. Yep. They're on the tour. They all have a, a pretty unique, fun story, so,

Brady Cloven 22:00

and I think that's what, you know, really is the, one of the other just attractive gems of, of Old Town is that Sure. We have. You know, a, a really fun mix of industries down here. Mm-hmm. Um, and stores. But there's that character that's here and that's why you come here. It's because there are stories wherever you go. And with this tour, we hope to just capture some of those and, and be able to showcase them more. Yeah. And then, I mean, on top of the history of us, there's another walking tour we just started called Merchant Stroll. And really this is just a way to engage businesses. So we, like you said, we do a ton of community engagement mm-hmm. Because that's, you know, how we keep going. Yeah. Um, but we have monthly community meetings, which, you know, Sarah, you've come to before. Mm-hmm. And that's a way to engage the merchants mm-hmm. And residents. Mm-hmm. But for those who can't make it the third Friday of each month, we're going out, um, and we're taking a city council member mm-hmm. And maybe another nonprofit, um, friend from around town. Yeah. And then just visiting businesses and asking'em how they're doing, what they're worried about, how they're feeling about the upcoming season. Yeah. Whether it's holidays now or maybe in the spring next year. Um, and we did our first one last month and it was really well received. Like people just like to be heard. Yeah. You know, imagine that. Um, but getting out there in stores and seeing, meeting people where they're at, goes. It goes, uh, a long way. Yeah. So, um, if anybody's interested in that, you're more than welcome to tag along. We'll usually post on our Facebook page about like what specific time. Um, we don't wanna make it the same time every Friday because, you know, different stores are open later and close earlier and people may not be able to get there on time, like if you're working, but we want to be able to include as many people as possible. Absolutely.

Dan Hoffman 23:31

And one of the things I'm sure you hear occasionally is. Occasionally we have some unhoused residents, uh, on the walking mall. Mm-hmm. Uh, sometimes that creates a little bit of friction between the businesses, the faith-based community mm-hmm. The service providers that are trying to help them, the customers. It's, you know, today is not the day to go into all the complexities of it, but, um, it is great. We do have a downtown officer, everyone. I'm sure remembers Mark Lehman, who, uh, has retired, but I think you'll still see him around. He's coming

Sarah Frey 24:05

back. Rumor has it,

Dan Hoffman 24:06

rumor has it, you'll still see him around. But we have a new, uh, full-time officer down in the walking mall. Uh, corporal Sloan is gonna be joining us. I think he has already joined us.

Sarah Frey 24:15

Yes. Yep. Last week.

Dan Hoffman 24:16

Joined us last week. Uh, so a new face that will be seen, you know, the, the officer will be focusing a lot on the entirety of the mall. Um, but we'll be kind of paying a little more attention to some problem areas where, you know, maybe we get folks that. Congregate or camp or, you know, potentially they like to hang out in the cafe sections of certain restaurants. So we're, we're gonna be a little more proactive. Um, now that we have our new downtown officer, uh, and a few other, I think, exciting programs that we'll be able to announce in the next few weeks to help alleviate those concerns, especially as we're getting into the busy holiday season.

Brady Cloven 24:56

That's incredible. I mean, it's, um, you know. I only know because I've worked with you guys a lot, but just the amount of effort and maneuvering it takes to get a dedicated officer downtown. Yeah. Like that is wonderful. Yeah. So thank you for you all and whoever else made that possible, because you know, like you said, we're not gonna get into it all today. But even just having that, that. Um, stable figure. Mm-hmm. There somebody walking around, like tons of communities have incredible community engagement from there. Um, police officers and, you know, even talking with Chief Lewis, you know, that's a big part of, of what he wants to do to his community engagement, so absolutely. Thank you.

Dan Hoffman 25:32

Absolutely. So. If someone wants to learn more about foot, where should someone go?

Brady Cloven 25:38

Oh man, it's so fun this time being able to actually have places. Um, if you wanna learn more about being on the foot patrol. Oh, that's so good. You can, uh, jeez. Turtle's reference. I was, uh. In the mirror today, in the bathroom. Just rehearsing that right before this. Um, so I'm glad I landed it. Put that one down in your diary. That's a good one. Um, I'll, uh, timestamp this one, but no, you can go find us on social media. So Facebook is Friends of Old Town. Um, and then if you go on Instagram, it's Friends of Old Town, wink, WINC, like Winchester. Um, and then if you go to our website, uh, friends of all town.org, that's where you'll find the community calendar where you can also submit your events. But also see what's happening at any time on the mall. Um, you can go there and see the different committees that we have. So if you're interested in any of these projects or events that we talked about and you wanna get involved, um, you can fill out a volunteer form there as well. We have about 50 volunteers right now from around the community. Um, so there's always something for you to do. Yeah. You just gotta tell us what you wanna do. Fantastic,

Dan Hoffman 26:35

Brady, thanks for coming back to the show. Yeah, I'm sure we'll talk to you again in the future. Everybody go check out, uh, the old town this holiday season. You know, you've got. It, it really is probably the most special time to walk down the mall when it's all lit up. Uh, when it starts getting a little crisp fall here is pretty spectacular. So spend a little time, uh, downtown in the old town this holiday season. Thank you very much, Brady. Thank you. Thanks to Brady and thank you for joining us on the Rouse Review. Next time we're talking Transit with the win ready expert, Kenny Johnson and Justin Hall. Uh, until then, we'll see you around City Hall.