Date: Sun, 4 May 2008 00:34:51 EDT
From: Jim and Leslie Palmer
Subject: Endorsing Jeffrey Starkweather for County Commissioner
Chatham County needs commissioners who appreciate the cultural uniqueness of Chatham County.
Chatham’s strong and growing creative community and its natural beauty are just two of the reasons Jim and I are proud to call Chatham County our home. We have known Jeffrey Starkweather for several years now and we know how much he cares, his keen understanding of the challenges of growth, his enthusiasm for finding solutions and his support of the arts.
Jeffrey Starkweather understands the economic impact and vitality that the arts bring to Chatham. He has advocated for the arts in the past and will continue to strengthen that support if elected.
Jeffrey served as a board member of ChathamArts 2001-2008, during which time he devoted much of his energy in advocating to make arts an integral part of the county economic development strategy
During 2006 Jeffrey worked with George Lucier, Carl Thompson and Tom Vanderbeck to make sure that Arts and culture as economic development tools and quality of life enhances part of their platforms.
Served at the General Store’s attorney in 2004-05 in helping to bring in their initial community investments for stabilizing the finances of and making needed improvements to the General Store.
Sally Kost and Jeffrey made sure that arts and culture were part of a placed-based economic development strategy in each of the citizen platforms used by the Coalition in its election efforts.
Jeffrey lobbied to get arts and culture as an element of economic development a priority in non-profit funding in the county budget.
As the Secretary of the Chatham County Economic Development Corporation (EDC) and chair of its strategic plan subcommittee Jeffrey successfully lobbied to develop an economic development strategy for the county that makes the promotion of arts and culture an integral part of our job attraction strategy.
For example, the county “vision for the future” state: “Chatham County’s strategic location between the Triad and Triangle regions coupled with the county’s strong quality of place, including rural character, arts and amenities, have positioned the County as a preferred location for emerging growth companies.
Jeffrey wrote the non-profit funding request that resulted in ChathamArts obtaining two years’ funding for one-half of its Executive Director position.
He worked with ChathamArts and other stakeholders to promote concept of a performing arts center in downtown Pittsboro and obtained county support for a feasibility study.
Promoted the concept of celebrating local culture and bridging the divide between newcomers and long-time residents and natives by having local arts use community history and stories as the basis for painting community murals.
Supports adapting a program similar to the Handmade in America catalogue of local artists to be made available to realtors and builders to promote new home purchaser/builder use of local art and artisan details in design, construction and landscape.
Agrees with the idea of setting aside 1% of the cost of new county buildings for public art.
Those of us who care about the quality of life in Chatham County have a friend in Jeffrey Starkweather.
Jim and Leslie Palmer
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