This is the third segment of the interview we did back in November with Tracy O’Drain and Michelle Feldman of the Frankford CDC. What does Michelle’s job encompass.
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Tag: Michelle Feldman
Frankord Gazette Interview with the Frankford CDC Part 2
This is the second segment of the interview we did back in November with Tracy O’Drain and Michelle Feldman of the Frankford CDC. At the time, Tracy spoke about having a computer facility at the CDC and prophet that I am, I thought that was madness. So much for my gift of prophecy.
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Main Street Beat
Main Street is the name used for Frankford Avenue back when Frankford was borough in the county of Philadelphia prior to the great consolidation in 1854. Michelle Feldman is the Commercial Corridor Manager of the Frankford Community Development Corporation. Her job is to encourage new business to come in and to help existing businesses who are here to grow and thrive. She has been with the CDC for about 8 months now and spends anywhere between 10 and 20 hours a week on the Avenue. She works closely with about 20 to 25 businesses on the Avenue, though of course is always eager to work with more. Main street is her beat.
Below is a video of her conversation with Therice Denby of Denby’ Sweet Sensations discussing how the CDC helps businesses on the Avenue.
Second Saturday Update from the Frankford CDC!
We at the Frankford CDC would normally post a wrap up of this past weekend’s Second Saturday arts festival, but unfortunately the weather interfered with our event this time around. Even though it ended up being a beautiful day, our artists and performers were understandably concerned about the threat of rain and how that may have damaged their work. We are going full steam ahead with our October 8th Second Saturday fest, and will be posting more details in the coming days. Rest assured we are going to end our season with a bang – you won’t want to miss out on it, we promise! As always, Michelle Feldman is available to answer all of your questions. Give her a call at 215-743-6580 or email her at mfeldman.fcdc@gmail.com. She’d love to hear from you!
Frankford Community Development Corporation
This is a guest post by Michelle Feldman of the Frankford CDC. Michelle is the Corridor Manager and Special Events Coordinator.
First of all, thanks to Bob for allowing us to guest post on the Gazette, and for all of the support he has given us over the years.
We at the Frankford CDC want to take this opportunity to share what we do every day, and to invite suggestions and comments regarding what other special projects we should tackle, and what else we should fold in to our day to day work.
Right now we are focused on assisting the businesses along the Avenue, and trying to attract new entrepreneurs to start their enterprises here in Frankford. We try to help existing or prospective business owners navigate the various City agencies, as well as identify and apply for various sources of funding. We also work to cut the vacancy rate along the Avenue, and help to keep the Frankford Business and Professional Association running smoothly. In addition, we plan and execute special events that we hope will be enjoyable for Frankford residents, but also attract new people to the area in the hopes that they will see all of the wonderful things about Frankford that we see. We are in the midst of our first series of summer arts festivals (the next one is September 10th from 12n to 3p on the 4700 block of Frankford Avenue – please come out and join us!). And stay tuned for more information about our Haunted History tour coming up in October.
Currently, we are working on several special projects that we hope will be a part of kickstarting the revitalization of the Avenue. Most importantly, we are working to turn vacant properties in to temporary arts and community galleries. The goal is not just to create a meeting space and attract artists to Frankford, but also to market the too-numerous vacancies on the Avenue. We are also partnering with Startup Corps, a nonprofit organization that runs year long youth entrepreneurship programs in high schools throughout the City through which students start their own businesses, to try to bring the program to Frankford High. In addition, we are working to bring strategic types of businesses to Frankford; specifically, we are actively attempting to attract a coffeeshop / cafe to our area. Through this project, as well as through our relationship with Startup Corps, we have had the good fortune to meet a lot of great entrepreneurs, and have actually brought two new small businesses to Frankford.
Last, we are actively stepping up our online presence. We recently started a blog (www.frankfordcdc.blogspot.com), we have revamped our website (www.frankfordcdc.com), and we are avid facebook users (friend us at http://www.facebook.com/#!/FrankfordCDC)! We’ve partnered with Northeast Treatment Centers, with whom we are also working on a community garden project, to update the jobs section of our website, which will soon host searchable video interviews of job seekers. We have also restarted our monthly newsletter, which we post on our blog and facebook page. Let us know if you’d like to start receiving our newsletters!
This is just some of what we do. But we really want to hear from you, and we truly need your participation. Come out to our events. Come meet us and tell us how we can be better serving you. Give us a call any time at 215-743-6580 – or email Tracy at todrain.fcdc@gmail.com or Michelle at mfeldman.fcdc@gmail.com. We can’t do this with out you!
