Merry Christmas from DADi. Hope you all have a wonderful Christmas season! Thank you for your support throughout 2009, we look forward to the year to come!!

Announcing new ownership, new business growth, and 19 Deuel County jobs saved at Midwest Performance Converter in Gary, SD! This is a big deal for our community, so please join the Midwest Converter team and help celebrate their Grand ReOpening. Tour the facilities, and learn about the manufacturing work they do!

I’m excited to announce the Buffalo Ridge’s 1st ever Bridal Show will be on January 24th, 2009. It will be a great afternoon with lots of wedding ideas to take in… So, Save the Date, plan to join us there, and bring a friend! We’d appreciate if you could help us spread the word, so if you know someone getting married, or thinking of getting married, make sure to mention the Buffalo Ridge Bridal Show to them!

Buffalo Ridge is still accepting exhibitor applications, please contact Rachel at 605-272-7777 if you’d like to exhibit your product/service at the show.

Looks like November was a slow month for Clear Lake and Gary both. It will be interesting to see what kind of an impact local shopping throughout the holidays has had on our economy in the next month!

Clear Lake Sales Tax Revenue – through November

Gary Sales Tax Revenue – through November

I can hardly believe it’s December already… where did the fall go? Well ready or not, the December Calendar is here!

Click here to download your copy: December 2009 DADi Calendar or go to the Community Calendar link above and download it from there.

There’s a lot going on this holiday season and I look forward to seeing you all out and about this December!

According to a study done recently by The Urban Conservancy, local merchants have 4x the economic impact of national stores. The study found that,

“when compared to leading chain competitors on a per square foot basis, local retailers:

• generate 2 times the annual sales
• recirculate revenue within the local economy at 2 times the rate;
• have 4 times the economic impact in terms of wages, profits, procurement of goods and services, and charitable giving.”

Impressive stats, huh? …And this is exactly why you should shop local this holiday season.

Source: CoolTown Studios

As long as we’re on the local shopping topic… Clear Lake’s Mini Main Street will be held on December 5th!

Deuel Area Development & Deuel School will hold a Safe Routes to School exploratory meeting on Tuesday, December 8^th at 10am in the school’s Administrative Conference Room. Angela Olson, coordinator of South Dakota Safe Routes to School Program will provide an introduction to the program, explain the process, and discuss the possibility for Safe Routes to School project in Clear Lake.

Safe Routes to School (SRTS) is a federal, state and local effort to enable and encourage children, including those with disabilities, to walk and bicycle to school – and to make walking and bicycling to school safe and appealing. The program provides funding opportunities for schools and communities to undertake educational and promotional projects that encourage walking and biking options, as well as small scale infrastructure projects that fill gaps in the existing bicycle and pedestrian system. Projects are 100 percent federally funded, does not require a local match, and is a reimbursement grant program.

Any individuals interested in participating and assisting with this potential project are encouraged to attend the meeting on December 8^th.

Reminder that tonight we will have a meeting to discuss the potential for a bike path in Clear Lake. Anyone interested in participating in bike path project should attend!

5:30pm @ Clear Lake City Building

Here’s what we will discuss:

• Interest in project
• Trail route
• Trail funding
• Application requirements & process

Here’s the latest in Sales Tax for the City of Clear Lake and City of Gary. As of October 2009 , Gary has surpassed it’s 2008 sales tax cummulative total according to the SD Dept of Revenue. Shopping locally does so much to help our local economies, so please think about how you can shop locally this holiday season. Thanks everyone!

Clear Lake Sales Tax Revenue

Gary Sales Tax Revenue