Steering committee still taking input from villagers

YSCASC Chair Jerome Borchers reviews the results of one of
the breakout groups at last night's community forum.

Members of the Yellow Springs Center for the Arts Steering Committee were careful to assure the 100 or so attendees at last night's open forum that the group has been making progress. But the questions they were asking sounded very much like the queries they posed two years ago when the group launched its effort to create a center for the village's many artists that would also be a driver for economic development.

The issue the committee is faced with now, Chair Jerome Borchers told the gathering, is how to achieve the greatest good for the most people with limited resources. No mention was made of the property on Dayton Street, on which the group recently purchased an option, and it was clear that the committee is still looking for a location, and still wondering what a center for the arts should look like.

It was also clear that the closing of Antioch College and the subsequent effort to revive it had become significant factors to be considered by the group. Initially, there was the loss of access to facilities that were being used for the performing arts; now, the group has to consider what kind of interaction there will be with a new Antioch, if the Antioch College Continuation Corporation actually closes on the deal to purchase the college on Aug. 31. AC3 Chief Transition Officer Matthew Derr was in the audience, but was not one of the speakers.

The meeting broke up into five breakout groups, dance, theater, music, visual and media arts, and one for others. The questions posed to them were: "What do we need?" and "What do we want?" The responses weren't very different from what they were two years ago, but perhaps, tempered by the reality of the current economic crisis.

Also speaking at the event was Anita Brown, President of the Yellow Springs Arts Council, who talked about YSAC's reorganization and its long range goals. YSAC will be holding an open event at the Emporium at 7:00 p.m. on July 30, she said.