Members of Common Grounds of Cazenovia Inc. have begun to put their heads together with village officials and local non-profit organizations in order to establish a digital 24-hour community calendar and meeting center for Cazenovia residents and area visitors.

During a meeting hosted by 5 Ledyard Corp. on Tuesday, June 26, Common Grounds Inc. board members Sue Berger, Damian Vanetti, Doug Bullock and Maureen Fellows met with Chris Reynolds of CazAction, Cazenovia Village Trustee Jim Joseph, Trustee Dave Porter (who is also a Common Grounds Inc. board member) and 5 Ledyard CEO Jim Griffin.

“I think there is a real strong interest for multiple groups to get together and have the opportunity to communicate, collaborate and share resources,” Vanetti said. “We can all help each other out, for the benefit of the community. I think we’re trying to look at the broader picture, trying to provide a common … place and philosophy for the community.”

Common Grounds Inc. first met on Jan. 25 of this year, and began to work toward creating a mission statement. The group hopes to promote social well-being by establishing a “community living room” for Cazenovia and reducing the number of “redundant” programs in the area by consolidating efforts and possibly creating a community-wide calendar.

While Common Grounds Inc. is carefully examining all the possibilities, Griffin described the different types of educational, professional and community functions 5 Ledyard has been host to.

“We like to hold meetings, we like to host functions. We want to support anything important to the community,” Griffin said. “That was one of our missions when we took over this historic building.”

Also during the meeting, Bullock shared his idea for a potential digital calendar format using Prezi, a cloud-based presentation program. With it, Bullock used a photograph of Albany Street and coordinated a slide-show of informational briefs and calendar entries to illustrate how easy (and fun) exploring Cazenovia virtually could be, in the hopes of enticing both visitors and current residents to do so in reality.

Board members offered a list of areas where monitors displaying the community calendar might be most effective. Other ideas arose to make the calendar interactive, with touch screens.

As the meeting concluded, members were tasked with talking to area organizations and businesses to gauge overall interest levels. The group meets quarterly, and will look to gather again in the fall.

Pierce Smith is editor of the Cazenovia Republican. He can be reached at 434-8889 ext. 338 or [email protected].