Hemp, Hops and Shrooms

due to Likely bad weather, the city sent out the following press release tomorrow's Hemp Hops an Shrooms Festiva.

 Due to the forecast of inclement weather, Hemp, Hop & Shrooms Festival & Groundbreaking Ceremony, will now take place Saturday, September 28, at the Varsity Center with events starting at 3:00 p.m. and the concert starting at 7:00 p.m. 

While we’re saddened that we won’t be able to accommodate our beloved arts and crafts vendors at this time, our food trucks, Taste & Liv, Sidney & Solmon, and Taqueria Jimenez will still join in on the fun. Please support your local artists by shopping these folks' online stores, or coming out to our next event. 

All of our incredible presenters and demos will still take place, and we’ll wrap up the evening with the “Off the Rails” concert, featuring the amazing performances of Off the Rails and UNCHAiNED. We look forward to sharing this special day with you!

The schedule will proceed as follows:

Presentations

3-3:45PM Groundbreaking Ceremony for the Downtown Entertainment and Events Plaza with City of Carbondale

4-4:45PM Cooking with Mushrooms & Mushroom Extracts with Jessica Hatfield of Flyway Family Farm

5-5:25PM Terpene Aromas with Susie Lighty with Southern Illinois University Fermentation Science Institute (FSI)

5:30-5:55PM Using Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) technology to grow cannabis with Dr. Jose Leme, Gorman Saunders (Master's degree) and Lindsay Shupert (Ph.D.). SIU Cannabis Science Center

6-6:45PM Fun and Freaky Fungi with Mike Hatfield of Flyway Family Farm

Demonstrations 3-7PM

at the FSI & SIU Cannabis Science Center Event Tables

The Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) with Dr. Jose Leme, Assistant Professor of Cannabis Biology & Cultivation Systems College of Agricultural, Life, and Physical Sciences at Southern Illinois University Carbondale Gorman Saunders (Master's degree) and Lindsay Shupert (Ph.D.)

Growing Hemp for Fiber with Karla Gage Associate Professor of Weed Science and Plant Biology, School of Agricultural Sciences / School of Biological Sciences

Making Hop Infused Pours of the FSI’s King Ale, showcasing the various terpenes of the hop plant with Dr. Matt McCarroll, Director of the Fermentation Science Institute

Live Music 7-10PM

7-8:20PM UNCHAINED

8:30-10PM Off the Rails

Glenn Poshard Signings

 Glenn Poshard and author Carl Walworth will sign copies of Poshard's recently published biography "Son of Southern Illinois at three different locations on Wednesday August 9th. You can meet the pair and pick up a copy of the book at the Harrisburg District Library from 9:30 a.m. to 11 a.m.; noon to 1:30 p.m. at the Herrin City Library; 3 p.m. to 4 p.m. at the Stinson Memorial Library in Anna and 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Varsity Theater in Carbondale.

Movie Series

 the Varsity Center for the Arts wrapped up its summer movie series this past Saturday. Nice to see films playing in the venue again. Here is hoping they can make this a biannual or even quarterly event.

Varsity Theater

 The Varsity Theater is looking for additional funding and donations, otherwise it may have to close down , at least temporarily after November. Organizations like the Varsity Center help all of downtown. According to this show on the 1A, research on spending shows that every dollar a patron spends at a venue like the Varsity generates an additional $12 in spending at other local businesses like Quatros, Tres Hombres, Pagliai's and Dairy Queen because people go to see an event at the Varsity, then eat at a local restaurant either before or after the show. 

Varsity 80th Anniversary

In case you are free sometime between 1 and 10 today, there is an 80th anniversary celebration and fundraiser taking place at the Varsity Center for the Arts today. Looks as if most of the activity will take place in the lobby and under the marquee outside.

Paul Simon Public Policy Institute Survey Presentation

Caught the Paul Simon Public Policy Center's survey presentation at the Varsity Center for the Arts tonight. I got a round count of just about 100 people with the vast majority of them sporting a silver head of hair.  You can catch the full presentation on the Center's website but a couple of interesting takeaways.

Illinois as a whole has grown more liberal over the past 10 years or so with increased numbers approving of medicinal and recreational marijuana and abortion, both with restrictions and without. The attitude showing the greatest change owe was that of gay marriage, which went from less than a 30% approval rating to well over 80% of the state approving either marriage or civil unions, in less than 10 years.

Just under half of use want to cut any state programs to balance the budget, with public pensions the largest target, but still only 49% of respondents wanted to cut them. More popular was raising revenue, with 75% opting for a millionaires tax and lesser percentages opting for other methods such as a graduated income tax or increasing the gas tax. We like our programs, we just want someone else to pay for them.

1000 people were surveyed, with a margin of error of about 3.1%

Varsity Center Liquor License

Looks as if the Varsity Center for the Arts is requesting a change in the type of liquor license it has. From the LAB agenda for this Thursday:

Approval of minutes from September 3, 2015 3. Consideration of a request to reclassify an existing liquor license from a Class B2 (On-premises consumption of all liquors) to a Class J license (Public Arts Venue) for Varsity Center for the Arts at 418 South Illinois Avenue

4. Discussion of a proposed Liquor Code classification for Movie Theaters

Funding Requests

It's time for the annual requests for funding from the city by local civic organizations.  Funding will not be approved at this Tuesday's meeting, but organizations may make pitches to the council and the council members will discuss the various solicitations.  The only change the city staff recommended was to cut the Boys and Girls Club's request for $32,000 back to the 2012 grant of $30,000.

There are two unsolicited requests, one from the Varsity Center for the Arts for $30,000 to assist with the cost of repairs from sewer backup damage to the property and to replace drains in both theaters and install a protective seal on the front lobby doors to protect the building from future water damage.  The building does have drainage problems during heavy storms, due to its position at the bottom of a low hill, leading to flooding during periods of heavy rain.

Attucks Community Services is requesting $153,883 to help fund its program of youth and community programs.  This amounts to almost as much as the combined requests of all the organizations solicited by the city:  $188,150.

State of the City Address

Caught Mayor Fritzler's State of the City Address this afternoon. Apparently we have a McAllister's Deli coming to town and can expect to see (hopefully) Bandana's BBQ opening by the end of December.  2013 should see a new fire station open on the west side of town (and apparently, by some measure, Carbondale's fire department ranks in the top 10% of fire departments nationwide), work started on a bike path along the railroad tracks from campus to Town Square and long needed repairs and upgrades to the city's sewer and water systems.

Sales tax receipts have increased slightly but pension requirements still require substantial funding from the city and are of major concern.

The thing that really caught my attention was the mayor's reference to developing downtown as an "entertainment district". Others have proposed such a focus before, with talk veering betwix looking at downtown as the heart of Carbondale, as a shopping area or an entertainment district.  The entertainment district concept always seemed highly viable, especially given the concentration of bars and restaurants in the area, along with the Varsity Center for the Arts. What really struck me though was the mayor's reference to proposing some funding to actually develop the proposal in the form of an entertainment or food and drink tax or fee.  It will be interesting to see if anything actually comes of this, especially in conjunction with Carbondale Main Street's storefront rehabilitation projects.

Lights Fantastic

The city will start closing off streets in downtown about 3 p.m. tomorrow (some parking lots will start closing about 12:30) for the annual Lights Fantastic parade, reopening about 7:30 or soon after the parade ends.  there are a number of concurrent events going on as well:

Pictures with Reindeer (and other vendors) Friendship Plaza 4-7 p.m
Rotary Chili Supper:  Civic Center 4-7 p.m.
Letters to Santa:  Old Passenger Depot 4 -6 p.m
Downtown Cookie Walk::  various stores  4-6 p.m.
Warming Station:  Varsity Center for the Arts 5-6 p.m.