February 16, 2006

By Diane Chiddister

Before she moved to Yellow Springs a few years ago, Nancy Mellon had lived in a lot of different places. But in no place, she said, has she found the vitality and warmth that she feels in downtown Yellow Springs.

Mellon, a member of Village Artisans, has joined with several other local residents who don’t take downtown for granted.

Recently, they formed the Buy Local Campaign, a group that seeks to maintain the health and vitality of downtown by encouraging local residents to shop in town.

“Downtown is the heart of a community,” said Judith Hempfling, a member of the Buy Local Campaign and Village Council. “So many towns have lost their downtown, and they lost something important to the community.”

From March 31 to April 2, the Buy Local Campaign will kick off its efforts with a special weekend aimed at bringing people downtown.

The weekend will including a showing of Independent America: The Two Lane Search for Mom and Pop at 4 p.m. on April 1 at the Little Art Theatre.

The 80-minute documentary follows filmmakers Hanson Hosein and Heather Hughes as they travel through 32 states in search of small, independently owned businesses. The film “uncovers a growing discontent with corporate America and a growing movement toward ‘local’ in communities across the country,” says a press release on the documentary.

Weekend events will also include a Spring Art Stroll on Friday, March 31, from 6 to 10 p.m. Other activities are still in the planning stages.

The time is right for villagers to take action to support their downtown, said Mary Alice Wilson, the owner of Dark Star Books.

“I’ve seen the community reaching a tipping point in community activism,” Wilson said.

Several years ago, she said, the community didn’t seem ready for a Buy Local Campaign, but now she feels “a public energy that wells up and gets things done.”

There are many tangible and intangible benefits to having a healthy downtown in a small community, members of the campaign said.

The tangible benefits include being able to save time by shopping in downtown stores rather than having to drive 20 minutes to the mall, several campaign members said. For Bob Hasek, co-owner of Yoga Springs Studio and the advertising manager at the News, that convenience provides him with a flexibility he wouldn’t have otherwise when planning for yoga retreats, knowing he can run out at the last minute to buy tea or refreshments.

“If time is money, that convenience is indispensable for a business owner downtown,” he said.

Of course, not having to go to the mall also saves villagers from the stress of driving on congested roads and being jostled in crowds of strangers.

While the human connection made when you do business locally with someone you know is intangible, it is essential to building community, several campaign mem-bers said.

“When you do business at someplace like Lowe’s, the people are polite but you have no relationship, you won’t see them again,” Hempfling said. “If you do a lot of shopping that way, it’s much more impersonal.”

Some things may cost more in small, independent stores compared to big box stores, Mellon said, but the intangible human connection should matter as well.

“It may cost more sometimes,” she said, “but you also get something more.”

Besides the human connection, shopping locally benefits a community in some surprising economic ways, found a study by Civic Economics for LiveableCity in Austin, Texas. The study compared the economic impact on Austin of residents shopping at Borders Books to their shopping at a local bookstore.

According to study results, which are available at www.CivicEconomics.com, shopping at the local bookstore yielded three times the local economic impact. If each household in the county “simply redirected just $100 of planned holiday spending from chain stores to locally owned merchants, the local economic impact would reach approximately $10 million,” the study found.

Local shopping helps the local economy for a variety of reasons, the study stated, including the facts that small businesses provide the most jobs to new residents, local business owners invest in the community and in local nonprofits, money spent in local businesses is recirculated in the community much more than money spent in chain stores, and the environmental impact of independent stores, with less transportation needed to transport goods, is far less on the community.

As important as these economic benefits are, the human benefits are just as important, members of the Buy Local Campaign said.

“Some people say it’s not like the old days, but to me it’s a delight, being downtown and having people say hello or stopping to talk,” Mellon said. “I’ve lived in a lot of different places and you don’t get that.”

Others involved in the Buy Local Campaign include Tom Gray of Tom’s Market, Priscilla Moore of Mr. Fub’s Party and Kathy McLemore of Deaton’s Hardware.

The group meets each Thursday at 2 p.m. at the Senior Center Great Room and welcomes all interested persons to join them.

Contact: dchiddister@ysnews.com