(Reprinted with permission from the Owen Sound Sun Times)

It wasn’t bargain books, discount shoes or the heaps of cheap items merchants stacked on the street.

What drew Liz Thomas and her two small children, Rowan and Payton, to the annual Owen Sound Hottest Yard Sale Under The Sun were the ponies, clowns, dancers, local art displays and demonstrations, live music and other excitement that made the 21st annual event more a downtown street festival than a shopping spree.

“That’s what appeals to me as opposed to a sale,” Thomas said Saturday morning after walking along the four blocks of 2nd Ave. that were closed to traffic and set up with more than 100 booths and displays.

“I think if it was just a yard sale, I wouldn’t be bringing these two with me, so it’s nice that the whole family can enjoy it,” Thomas said.

That’s precisely what the newly revitalized Downtown Improvement Area management board had in mind this year, both chairwoman Sue Carleton and vice-chairwoman Maryann Thomas, who also heads the promotions committee, said during Saturday’s event.

“What we’ve tried to do is shift it slightly from the bargain discount focus, which is still there, but we’ve added the element of street festival,” said Thomas.

The Hottest Yard Sale Under The Sun is by far the DIA’s major annual event.

The city core was crowded from end to end Saturday.

The sounds of merchants hawking “leather shoes, just 10 dollars” mixed with a nearby acoustic guitarist busking with a djembe drummer. At the same time, a trio of belly dancers entertained in front of city hall. That area also included performances from children’s skipping, gymnastics and dance groups.

The on-stage entertainment was much expanded, with a new North stage programmed by The Owen Sound Celtic Society, a south stage with country, folk and roots music performers and the popular Bearcats rhythm and blues band anchoring the centre stage. Mixed among the merchants’ booths were non-profit groups raising money for such causes as the steeple restoration at St. George’s Anglican Church, while a local woodturners group showed how to use a lathe and the Sydenham Sportsmen’s Association’s volunteers helped kids build birdhouses to take home.

“What we’re trying to do is add other elements to make it into a family fun day and have activities and just really promote the idea that downtown is thriving,” said Thomas. “Obviously we’re local. You can’t get much more local than us and there’s lots going on here: culture, arts and music.”

The annual yard sale was an important DIA milestone this year, and a signpost pointing forward for an organization that has had its troubles.

Along with downtown enhancements, promotion and smaller events, it’s part of the DIA’s dual mandate under the Municipal Act to both beautify and promote the downtown on behalf of 350 members. They all must join and pay the annual fee because their business is within the defined downtown improvement area.

Disinterest and disgruntlement more than a year ago led to divisions on the board and eventual resignations from many board members and from the DIA’s two staff members.

After a year in transition with temporary staff, Carleton said the mostly new board — she came on as chairwoman toward the end of the troubled period — has set new goals and put difficulties behind it.

With new manager Irwin Seidman, new administrative assistant Carolyn Bigley and new promotional partnerships within the city, the DIA is rejuvenated, Carleton said.

Without detailing problems, she said the DIA committee structure had failed, a small group was trying to do too much, and “very probably they burned the staff out.”

Since then, a full “very positive thinking” board has restored the committees, adding to the leadership, spreading the workload and building partnerships beyond the downtown.

“We’re seeing much more of the positive,” Carleton said. “It’s a nice mix of people all working together. We don’t see ourselves as having these little boundaries. We see ourselves as part of the bigger whole. I think that is a change.”

Thomas joined the board a year ago, but has run The Ginger Press downtown for 30 years and served three years in the mid 1980s. She said during this “transition year” it was important to keep the yard sale component while shifting the focus of Saturday’s event to a much broader downtown promotion.

“With all the change that was going on there was an opportunity to bring in the kinds of things that I like, which is moving away from just the discount bargain and having more of a cultural focus,” she said.

Seidman also said shifting and expanding the event’s focus was about showing off much more of what downtown Owen Sound is really about.

“In order for any downtown to succeed, it has to be a community, so it has to be based on business, culture, art and residential. The long-term vision, at least in my mind, is for a full and vibrant community, so culture has to be a huge part of it,” he said.

“It’s not going to stop here. Next year I think we just keep expanding and bringing more and more to it.”

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Posted By BILL HENRY, SUN TIMES STAFF (Monday July 6, 2009)
© Owen Sound Sun Times
Reprinted with permission from the Owen Sound Sun Times
Article ID# 1642922
Image: © Willy Waterton -The Sun Times