Storefront Postering GO TO GREEN!

Postering Map - Day 1

Friday, April 19

On Tuesday, I got the call from Elaina that she needed help with storefront postering across the city, and could our volunteers help out?  Within 24 hours, the overwhelming response is - YES they can!


With all the responses rushing in, I needed a new way to keep track of Who is postering, and Where in the city.  My boyfriend showed me how to make a custom & updatable map in Google Maps.  After a bit of fiddling, I came up with the image in the top right, Postering Map - Day 1.  It's built like this:

• Red = Area not yet assigned to anyone for storefront postering
• Yellow = Area has been assigned, but touch-ups may be required
• Green = Area has been fully postered!

So our goal is to turn the city GREEN!


Hence, Google Maps - My Places is my new Toy du Jour.  Below is the latest map (see, already more yellow than on Day 1!), and I'm updating it as fast as the feedback is coming to me from the postering volunteers.  


View Westfest Postering - Storefront in a larger map



To anyone else who wants to join in the postering frenzy, here are the details:

• (a) You can call Claudia at the office (613-729-3565, Montreal Road Unit 1, Monday to Friday, 9 to 5) to schedule pick up of posters from the Vanier office. 
• Or (b) if Hintonburg is easier for you (I live & work at Hinton & Armstrong), send me an e-mail and I'll arrange a day & time to pass some of my posters off to you.

When you pick up your posters,

1. Let me know what area you plan to cover. so I can assign to you on the map and change the area to YELLOW (if you pick up from the Vanier office, please send me an e-mail with your area & approximate # of posters you picked up so I don't have to bother Claudia for the info)
2. Then be in touch with me every couple of days until your posters are all gone, so I know which areas or how much of the area you were able to cover, and can update the map to GREEN (and so that we don't send additional volunteers there). 

Please DO approach shops, restaurants, cafes, community centers, schools, etc. to request their permission to attach a poster to their door or front window or other space. If they have any Westfest questions or issues that are not directly answered on the poster (such as date, time, performers), please ask the proprietor to contact the Westfest office directly and they will be happy to help.


DO NOT attach posters to public billboards and poles - these will be done at the end of May so they aren't covered up before June.


Thanks again to all the Volunteers who have offered to help!

2012 Westfest Launch: Highlights & Reasons why I Volunteer

April 15, 2012

Reason #1: Elaina Martin's apparently boundless energy & vision.  I sit at the back of the room for the big Westfest media events, such as this past Friday's Westfest Media Launch at Clocktower Brewpub in Westboro Village.  And watch in awe as Elaina works the room and gets the media & the sponsors excited for another awesome line-up and another festival year.  With cameras rolling and flashing, the excitement is palpable and Elaina again does not disappoint.


The official Westfest Launch announcements & line-ups are all over the web: Ottawa Citizen, Ottawa Sun, and Xtra.  For me personally, the highlights include:

• Westfest, 10 years in the making article, by Rosalyn Stevens.  This year is Westfest's 9th anniversary, which means that Westfest has been in the making for an amazing 10 years.  Westfest's history in a nutshell is available in this article, and for myself, I am amazed at how far we've all come.
• Yasir Naqvi, MPP for Ottawa Centre reminded me of Reasons #2, 3 & 4: because we are (#2) free, (#3) family-friendly, and especially for our (#4) All-Ottawa programming  all-day Sunday. We have amazing bands in Ottawa, and I'm thrilled that Elaina continues to dedicate an entire day to our deserving local bands
• Jim Watson, our Ottawa mayor, is a huge Westfest supporter.  But even he acknowledges that city and government funding is marginal compared to business funding that Westfest pulls in.  Reason #5: Westfest is funded primarily by the Westboro neighbourhood, who also reaps the rewards of the festival.  As an economist by training, I love Westfest's business & funding model. 
• Food news: Elaina has signed up Stone Soup Foodworks to be at the main stage this year.  So we the volunteers, and our audience, can enjoy Slow Food. Fast.  

And Reason #6 is of course, the volunteers themselves.  At this year's Launch, I was reminded of all the wonderful volunteers that I continue to work with, and the volunteer alumni who have moved on to other things:

• Gail, who volunteered as Volunteer Management in 2008 & 2009, and along with Suzanne & Leslie provided energy & excitement to the volunteer tent.  I am thrilled that she is now the Volunteer Coordinator for Rideau Lakes Cycle Tour, although Gail plans to come back to Westfest for our 10th year anniversary.
• Don & Jen - Don first volunteered in 2009, brought Jen into our fold the following year.  No matter what position I asked them to do, they did it with a smile.  Also, did you know they are the team behind foodiePrints, a local food & restaurant blog with over 5000 followers?  Don & Jen are getting married this summer, so are not available to volunteer this year.
• F.C. Estrella, whom I knew as Faye Estrella, and as a 2006 Floater who was also highly reliable at filling in at our Artist Gate.  In 2007 Festrell performed as a Westfest Spoken Word performer, and this year ze is the curator for Westfest Spoken Word!  From backstage to stage to stage curator - I love it!

I am looking forward to meeting more wonderful people this year.  And, a post of current Senior Volunteers to come soon!

Out with the Old (Pizza), In with the New (Beer)

Vicissitude:

• a : the quality or state of being changeable : mutability
• b : natural change or mutation visible in nature or in human affairs

per http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/vicissitude

Thursday April 5, 11:34 pm

I've been intending to visit the Clocktower Brew Pub in Westboro since it opened in the fall, and even more so since my initial debriefing with Elaina. In 2011, Clocktower on Bank St generously hosted our Volunteer & Staff Party; I learned that for 2012 the Clocktower has stepped up their support and will also be our locale for the Volunteer Orientation Meeting on Tuesday May 1.

As with any change, I'm nonetheless a little sad that the Orientation Meeting won't be held at Moe's World Famous Newport Restaurant this year. Owner Moe Atallah has always been more than gracious to me and to the volunteers, and we will miss his pizza and the street-side view. My heart-felt thanks to Moe for all his support to the Volunteers over the years.

But the Clocktower sponsorship is a great coup, for the festival, the volunteers, and the Westboro neighborhood in general. So I needed a "reconnaissance mission" to get the lay of the new location, on south side of Richmond Rd, between Roosevelt & Golden Avenues. While on my mission, I discovered:

1. an open concept upstairs room
2. a area behind the bar that can be made private
3. Bytowne Brown ale - mmmmm beer!
4. that to meet with a manager, I should have come on a night when there WASN'T a Sens game and Good Friday the next day :-)

So there's lots of space, some of which we'll use for the Orientation Meeting, and the Volunteer & Staff Party (with the ever popular karaoke!) on Tuesday June 19. And I expect that the ENTIRE place will be filled on Friday April 13 at 10 am sharp for the Westfest Media Launch (yikes, coming up soon!). 

Having missed the manager however, I will (oh well!) need to visit again soon to try the mussels and another pint!

Springing Into Action

The wonderful thing about tiggers / Is tiggers are wonderful things / Their tops are made out of rubber / Their bottoms are made out of springs / They're bouncy, trouncy, flouncy, pouncy fun, fun, fun, fun, fun / But the most wonderful thing about tiggers is I'm the only one / IIIII'm the only one!  - Tigger

Mid-March, 2012

Spring sprung early in the Capital this year, and with these first warm days I am reminded that Westfest is just around the corner.


If I were a better Coordinator, a better person, a more organized person, I would be thinking about and involved in Westfest all year round.  Instead, by the middle of June every year, I have moved on to other things: summer vacation, the start of another school year, Christmas, work, family & friends, laundry, vaccinations for the cat, you know, life with a small "l".  So it always seems to be the smell of spring in the air that triggers the thought that, it is time to get back in touch with Westfest.


And so it was again this year.  I met with Elaina at the end of March.  I was briefed on developments for this year, and with Westfest there are always changes and new developments.  I attempt to debrief Elaina on my and the volunteers lessons learned from last year, but my memories are fuzzy, and I've found over the years that ultimately, she has learnt the same lessons without my input.


Elaina excitement is as infectious as always.  And I leave our first meeting of the year invigorated,  appreciated, and motivated to do my part to make this year's Westfest the best ever.  


This is my 8th year with Westfest, my 7th as the Volunteer Coordinator.  And every year it is a new beast, typically of the Tigger variety, to be tamed.  Which ultimately I love, I'm challenged by, and must be why I come back year after year.


Welcome Volunteers to Westfest 2012, the 9th edition.  Enjoy!