 The City of Brainerd did not make the cut as a finalist in a competition that will give out $500,000 to a city for small business revitalization. Brainerd was one of 10 finalists and on January 10th, city leaders made their pitch to the cast and crew of the Deluxe Corporation online show, Small Business Revolution. But today the list of 10 was whittled to five and Brainerd was not among the five finalists. Here's a portion of what Chamber President Matt Killian had to say in a video message after the finalists were revealed. I'd be lying if I said that we weren't all a little disappointed, a little shocked when our card wasn't flipped up on the Facebook Live announcement, but very shortly thereafter I can say that the feelings that we felt most of all were this tremendous sense of community pride and gratitude for this journey that we've all been on together for the past couple of months. We can all take great heart in knowing that we couldn't have done anything more to make Brainerd's case to win this contest. Deluxe received 30,000 nominations for cities to be included in the contest. The final five cities are Alton, Illinois, Amesbury, Massachusetts, Bastrop, Texas, Martinez, California, and Siliome Springs, Arkansas. If you enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland PBS.