Next PottsTOWN Talk to Focus on Economy

Emanuel Wilkerson

Pottstown School Board member Emanuel Wilkerson will host his second community meeting of his Pottstown Talks series on Tuesday, Sept. 13.

This talk will focus around economic development and community engagement.

The meeting will take place at Connections on High Café, 238 E High St., starting at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Sept. 13.

There will be presentation by local economic development authorities and local realtors on how can the community get involved with the redevelopment of Pottstown, along with same small group brainstorming sessions.

“I’m excited to bring the community back together for our second PottsTOWN Talks, so we can brainstorm together on ways to help our local economic development authorities rebuild our town as a united Pottstown," Wilkerson said in a press release.

Discussion at the
last meeting

"I want to urge the community to grow this coalition for the future of Pottstown by coming, sharing and bringing a friend,” he said.

Wilkerson held his first PottstownTOWN Talk on Aug. 1 and it attracted nearly 100 people.

There, a crowd beyond the usual suspects who show up to such meetings reviewed the oft-made complaints about the town, but also talked about what makes Pottstown great and engaged in discussion about solutions as well.

This next meeting is designed, Wilkerson said, to focus that discussion on the subject of economic development and to put the enthusiasm generated at the last meeting to work in focus groups exploring specific actions.

First 'Town Talk' is the Talk of the Town

Photos by Evan Brandt

Council Vice President Sheryl Miller, standing at left, speaks during the first-ever 'Town Talk' event organized by school board member Emanuel Wilkerson, standing at right.

"Can we talk?"
That was the simple idea behind Pottstown School Board member Emanuel Wilkerson's desire to gather as many people in town in one place and have a conversation about the future.

Valerie Jackson was the first people in the crowd to speak up.

The place was Connections on High in space designed exactly for this kind of event.

Wilkerson set out an ambitious discussion agenda, with three major topics, social diversity, the future of Pottstown and involvement of our youth.

As with most agendas at open meetings, it was a way to get things started and once they got started, they hummed along pretty well.

There was the requisite reminiscing about how vibrant Pottstown used to be, but there were also new voices and new ideas, something a public meeting in Pottstown has not experience very often in recent years.

Emanuel Wilkerson begins the forum.

If nothing else, having people other than the usual suspects resulted in some new ideas and what seemed to this observer to be a burgeoning sense of pride in town -- one of Wilkerson's goals.

As lifetime residents spoke about all there is to do in town, and new residents talked about why they moved to Pottstown and what they like about it, it seemed to down on people that perhaps its time to stop letting other people define their town.

Wilkerson indicated that he intends to host another meeting next month, although no date was announced.

Lets hope it happens because things are off to a good start.