REWIND: "A growing network of people and institutions that openly and enthusiastically invite positive change and progress to our city."

Originally written and repurposed almost three years ago on October 29, 2005, the following was an idiosyncratic, quasi state of the union effort from a still in utero gadfly. Politicians, blogs, and apparently financial markets have appeared and vanished in the interim, but it's a reminder - to me at least - of how I convince myself of this town's worth or my self's worth to this town or possibly just another neurosis.

I'll leave that adjudication to readers, knowing it at least made the boss happy at one point and that I'll have (hopefully) survived my umpteenth annual Harvest Homecoming in the parking lot of the old Rainbo Bread building with the Derby City Roller Girls as either penance or payment by the time we encounter the same month and number this year.


Yesterday we referred readers to Randy Smith’s Volunteer Hoosier coverage of the Democratic Party fete at the Grand on Thursday evening.

Unsurprisingly, Randy’s piece prompted an ill-tempered response from someone hiding behind a bizarrely contrived Internet pen name:

Your comments, sir, make me want to puke. You are still wet behind the ears … more than your labeled "Gang of Four" weren't there … my party is fine, sir; you, sir, are not.

Anonymous cowardice having become the little person's Olympic medal sport in New Albany thanks to the tireless efforts of Trog Sham’s cyber-vandalism contingent, we would expect to find nothing particularly noteworthy in such a response ... except, in this case, it inspired our friend bluegill to compose the following riposte, one fully deserving of reprinting in this space owing to his clear, economical prose and a devastatingly accurate description of the facts -- not the opinions -- of where we are, and where we're going.

Feel free to enjoy Jeff's words as much as we have.

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I'm still trying to figure out what there is to be learned from a group that's been largely unsuccessful for decades. After a year, I still have no idea what positive notions I'm supposed to glean from petty, ill-conceived and badly executed attacks on rationality. If anything, they've proven themselves to be informative as a sort of collective anachronism, a symbolic view into the darker past that created the conditions many are now working to reverse. They aren't Rosa Parks. They're the bus.

There are any number of people who've done more to improve conditions in New Albany in a year or two than have any of the usual cast of malcontents in a lifetime.

To clarify, that statement isn't made to discourage or disenfranchise those in (or outside) the party who've dedicated years of honest work to New Albany's improvement. In fact, it should serve to bolster their spirits and provide inspiration for redoubled efforts.

The days of feigning happiness and forcing smiles when a Dan Coffey or Larry Kochert wins an election, purely out of a sense of loyalty to the party, are coming to a distasteful but inevitable end. As their public lives haven't afforded much respect for or understanding of the concepts of grace or dignity, neither should their political deaths be expected to engender such traits. Dead, however, is dead.

According to almost all the longtime party members with whom I spoke last night, the dinner was a success not only because of the notable and not-so-notable absences but also because the speakers enjoyed a view that included so many new faces.

Whether party leadership has the gumption to engage the minds behind those faces and harness their energy to further enable the work of those who are actually creating progress in the streets everyday remains to be seen. To the extent that they do, I'll support them.

Because after the aforementioned year (the timeframe of which not at all coincidentally dovetails with the opening of Destinations, the debut of NA Confidential, the continued strengthening of the East Spring Street and S. Ellen Jones neighborhood associations, the revival of the Downtown Merchants Association, the work of Mike Kopp, and the finalization of plans for Scribner Place), this is what I know:

There is a growing network of people and institutions that openly and enthusiastically invite positive change and progress to our city. It was evident when my wife and I began looking for a home here. It is evident in our own efforts to communicate our belief in the potential of New Albany to others.

Most people I've met in the past year are not only willing to put forth an invitation to new residents and businesses, but also to do the leg work necessary to nurture and sustain their presence here. And make no mistake, that sense of pride and potential is spreading exponentially.

I know people who've convinced families and businesses to move here. I know those families and businesses are extolling the benefits of their choice to others just like them. And I know those people aren't just from Jeffersonville, Clarksville or Louisville. They're from Rhode Island, New York, California, Florida and foreign countries. Even the natives are beginning to see what's so clearly evident to those from elsewhere: New Albany, with its pioneering, multicultural heritage and regionally unparalleled historic resources, if matched with even a modicum of modern sensibility and cooperative vision, can regain its long lost position of being a place that matters.

The fear that “foreign” proposition creates in some is an aberration, a minor annoyance along the path to progress and should be dealt with as such. It's simply no match for the determination and talent of those who can do, are doing, and will do, whether out of a duty to their ancestry or a love of possibilities.

This is evidenced by the fact that, when I have occasion to help facilitate or participate in increasingly popular public affairs symposiums, neighborhood gatherings, educational activities, and various other meetings with investors, bankers, property owners, academics, and real estate and cultural agents- all with the aim and often the resources to turn that potential into a tangible, concrete reality- the naysayers are not present. Ever. Revitalization efforts are occurring in spite of them, not because of them.

And for that, I say to hell with them. They're irrelevant.

What is relevant is a continuing and increased cooperation between agencies and individuals, between money and ideas, and an overriding, pervasive DIY spirit. New Albany doesn't need heroes; it needs partnerships and at least one partner stares back at each of us in the mirror everyday.

If you have money to spend, spend it here. If you have an old pick up truck, help haul your neighbor's repair supplies. If you have a building department to rebuild, rebuild it straightaway.

The horn has been tooted, ladies and gentlemen. Now it's time to bring the instruments together to play a song.