 Good morning everybody. This is a great day to be in North Columbia City of Columbia Richland County. We stand here today under this great sunshine that we got from our good Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We say thank you again for being here. Welcome to the time capsule celebration here in the North Columbia area. On behalf of the North Columbia Business Association I am Jamie Devine. I am one of the board members here as well. I'd like to welcome each of you here to NOMA's time capsule celebration. As you can see changes are underway in the North Columbia area and this is a time and a period of transformation. In today's event will allow us the opportunity to freeze time and to capture where we are at this moment. The innovation, synergy and development that is taking place in our area is continuing to expand. It is our hope that in 10 years from now we can open this time capsule and see the relics and the information that we're placing in the time capsule today. We'll convey those values, the sense of community and the collective vision to make this area the best that it can be. I would also like that this time take a personally thank a few folk at this time if they would please stand or raise your hand. The folk here, Studio 2LR, are they here as well? All right thank you guys so much. I would like to knowledge of the board members and volunteers of the North Columbia Business Association, Sabrina Edwards who is our executive director. Any of the board members that are here as well? All right thank you guys as well. Riston County Council was here being represented in the other council persons in the audience. City of Columbia, want to thank you all for being here as well. The Office of Business Opportunities. Melissa, see her in the back. The Public Relations from City of Columbia, thank you all so much for what you do on a daily basis. And then the Columbia, City of Columbia Parks and Recreation for this wonderful tent. We should have had a couple more tents. We didn't know the crowd was going to be here, but thank you so much. And again to everyone who has made this possible on behalf of the North Columbia Business Association, we say thank you. The program will go as outlined. Next is the Prayer of Unity by Chaplain Greg Sweet. Good morning everybody. I put down for my prediction when I signed. My prediction is that within a hundred years, South Carolina will win the National Championship in football. So that is my prediction. All right, let's pray together. Thank you so much for prayer, the opportunity to call up on your name. Remind us all that prayer is so important as one man wrote that prayer is as essential as breathing. Lord, the most important thing we can do we're doing right now. We're coming together to celebrate. We're coming together to pray. Lord, we're reminded in your word that you are holy, that you're awesome, that you're majestic, that you created the world and all of us that you know us by name. According to Psalm 139, you see us when we stand up. You see us when we sit down. You know the things that we do and what is so amazing to me in a world filled with so many people, you know the very thoughts that we have. And so we acknowledge your greatness, your holiness, your majesty. We also acknowledge that we are afraid people that we have sin in our lives that we're far from being the people we need to be. And Lord, today we're reminded of how important it is to come together as one. Lord, your word tells us that you made from all people that you made us from one blood, that all of us are related no matter what divides us. And we're thankful that in you every person is precious in your sight. Jesus that you died on the cross for all of us. That is the old song that we learned as a child growing up red, brown, yellow, black and white. They are precious in his sight. And so Lord, as we come together this day, thank you for the hard work that's made all this possible. Thank you for those in leadership position here and throughout the city of Columbia. And Lord, may we seek to have a community that honors you where there is love for one another. And it's in the name of Jesus Christ, crucified in risen that we pray amen. Very exciting to be here for those of you who look back on 10 years on North Main Street and see how much changes happen over those 10 years in 10 years from now, it will be unrecognizable. So I want to encourage each and every one of you to realize that our future is indeed subjective. It is what we make it. So not don't just participate in this ceremony today. But as you go up and down Main Street, not while you're driving, as our police officers will tell you, but take your own pictures every day on Facebook, on your iPhones and other devices. You'll get a reminder of what happened three years ago and four years ago and five years ago. And you'll see what the leadership not just our state and local leadership and federal leadership from Congressman Coburn but with the incredible business leadership and neighborhoods and business associations, what we've been able to do over these next two years, we do believe that the future is indeed subjective. We do believe that this is an incredible place to live that to live, work, play and prosper and educate. We can do all those things. Helping revitalize an existing commercial corridor is very different than greenfield development out in the country somewhere. You have beautiful neighborhoods, silver neighborhoods surrounding this area. You're talking about greenfield development, but also brownfield development. You're talking about preservation, but at the same time talking about building a new is a complex challenge. But one I know that this entire community is up to. And there's people from the city of Columbia who are never going to hear from Councilman Duvall. I will tell you on behalf of Councilman Davis and Mayor Pro Tem Devine and everyone else on City Council and our incredible staff, they will look forward to working with you and thank Studio 2LR. I think just looking at this building behind us and remembering what was here just once ago and in seeing the transformation in 10 years, we won't recognize this. It's our goal and our responsibility to make sure that the development that comes here to North Columbia is consistent with our values as a city. It's consistent with the type of development we want to see, not just with wants to come here and working together, we can certainly create the desired future state. It's going to take each and everyone's working together. Thank you. God bless you. Good morning, everyone. It is indeed an honor and privilege to be here and to bring you some remembrances of North Columbia and Chairman Livingston will bring some visions moving forward. I do want to pause and also recognize also joining us this morning. We've got Senator John Scott. Senator Scott, thank you for being here and Representative Chris Hart, who is fanning. Thank you, Representative Hart for being here. When I think about North Columbia, particularly I'll take a point of personal privilege. I bought my first home in North Columbia in 1999. It was I could have right out of law school could have chosen to move anywhere in the city of Columbia. But North Columbia was an area that I identified not only was close to downtown and would keep me close to inner city, but was a thriving area, a place that had a lot of promise, but also had amazing people. And it's very important when you talk about investing and where you're going to live. And eventually, of course, get married and have children, a place that is a real community, a neighborhood where the folks that in so many times now we don't have folks who know their neighbors and reach out. But North Columbia is an area where people know their neighbors. They're involved. They're involved in the city. They keep us accountable. But they're also involved in looking out for their neighbors. So I invested in my first home in 1999. Single, no kids just entering the job market. And I saw what makes me love Columbia so much. And so I went on after I got married and started having children. Jay man I invested in our home together again here in North Columbia. We were challenged being a young couple in North Columbia because you would need to drive out to go to the grocery store. We had no grocery store close to us. We had very few eating options. And we like to eat out a lot. We need it someplace. But as I look back on the last 10 years, we have lots of options here in North Columbia and it's continuing to grow. Just last week we said we wanted to go out and have dinner and and our daughters wanted to go to warm out and we were able to go very close and sit down and have a dinner. My 14 year old said, Mom, I want to go get lunch. Take me over to know Noma Mediterranean. And we were able to grab a quick lunch. And so when you look at the changes and investment here, not just the public investment, but it is the personal investment that all of us have made into making this place home and not just home for us, but a place that anybody in the Midlands will want to come to people are investing in businesses here, people are investing in homes here. We've got great infrastructure like Oralwood Park. And so when you look at the last 10 years, we have we have accomplished so much. But we know we have so much more to accomplish. And I'm excited about what we will see in the next two, five and 10 years in North Colombia. So thank you all so much for being here. I ask you to continue to just remember, not just remember where we've come, but also take that remembrance of where we've come in encouragement on how much more we can accomplish as we continue to work together. And we pull together our businesses, our government leaders, our community leaders and our churches. So thank you again for being here. And God bless you. What a great, great day for North Colombia. You know, I was asked to talk a little bit about the vision for the future. Let me start off by saying, you know, what comes to mind for me is for North Colombia to be a first choice community. When someone think about a place to live, a place to recreate, a place to do business, we want them to say our first choice is North Colombia. You know, and I'm confident that that's going to happen because of you, because of your commitment and dedication to holding us accountable and making us do what we need to do to make your community the best possible community it could become. You know, I won't say how long I was about to say how long I lived in North Colombia, but I lived in North Colombia since I was age 10. So now don't don't start trying to add that up. That's been a little while. And I remember when North Maine was a very vibrant North Maine. And many of y'all may or may not remember on this corner here. There was a great thrive in the room. There's a nice gas station right across the street here. We had a Christian Queen donut shop. We had Coca Cola barling company. It was thriving. My vision is to go back and beyond that what we saw many, many years ago in our community. And we can do that. And we're going to do that because of the commitment that Richard County Council has with the City of Colombia to partner and collaborate to make sure we miss nothing you need for your community to be the best possible community it could be. We're doing that by, you know, first of all, the landscaping and the beautification of North Maine. We're going to do that in every capacity we can. So again, just call on us. Let us know what we can do as a kind of government to continue to do to help this community to describe to become to be what it is and what it can be. So again, thank you. Thank you. And you continue to do what you do. The vision will be unrealistic beyond imagination. Thank you. Well, I have a North Maine Street story to it'll be brief. But I see Columbia College represented on the front row. Many decades ago, my sweetheart was at Columbia College. She graduated from Columbia College. I worked at Ruth Hardware one summer, which is now in to be close to her. And we celebrated our 54th wedding anniversary last week. So it worked. I remember this street very well from decades ago. Let me read this proclamation that has been proclaimed by Mayor Benjamin and the City Council. Whereas NCBA Time Capsule Community Day was founded on July 31, 2019 and is sponsored by the North Columbia Business Association and Studio to LR to bring people together in unity. Whereas NCBA Time Capsule Community Day in North Columbia occupies the footprint of North Columbia communities in Columbia South Carolina. And whereas NCBA Time Capsule Community Day seeks to highlight neighborhoods and business in the North Columbia area that provide a positive impact to the community. And whereas North Columbia Business Association Time Capsule Community Days was presented Wednesday, July the 31st, 2019 and sponsored by the North Columbia Business Association as an annual community day. Whereas NCBA Time Capsule Community Day is a community building project, building relationships, building trust and building love for each other. Whereas NCBA Community Day continues community outreach and supports our neighborhoods and business and strengthens communities. And whereas NCBA Time Capsule Community Day is an annual event of the North Columbia Business Association where we invite all our neighbors and business to celebrate the Time Capsule Countdown each year with our partners and friends. Now therefore, I, Stephen K. Benjamin, Mayor of the City of Columbia, South Carolina, along with my fellow members of Columbia City Council do hereby proclaim that this city honors and recognizes July the 31st, 2019 as NCBA Time Capsule Community Day. We have listened to some very good stories about this particular card of the City of Columbia. I wanted to just share a brief story with you. In 1983, we made our first investment in a North Main Street card. We thought that the 5,000 block of North Main Street would take off and have the growth that this particular area had. We then opened up a business on the Marcia Street and decided not to go into the 5,000 block after we had made that investment. And we moved into the 2,000 block, which is right around the corner, making an investment buying a property. We applaud the City of Columbia for the many loans they had, for programs, for construction and other, but we decided to use private dollars to do that. Now after 36 years of having a business investment in this community, I think it's only fitting as we look down the road to see what the next 10 years will actually look like. I can say to you that the last 10 years we really, really began to fill in a lot of vacant buildings that have been sitting idle for a long time. People are really beginning to take a real look at this particular area in terms of small businesses coming in. We were sad to see the Caliq dealership leave, but we're hoping that at some point we'll get a large, a large small business that is expanded to come into that space. It's always good to be with you and let me also say, as a commitment always from the state of South Carolina, and yes, the Senate District is in this area. Matter of fact, it begins at my office. Now, the state, the last time we began to do the road infrastructure, did invest millions of dollars to make sure this project continued to grow. We see we have got a new neighbor coming with the Columbia Urban League coming into the community, and I know some other small business will follow, follow suit behind it. This is a great day, a great time for this area of the city of Columbia. Thank y'all so much. We'll continue to work to make this a better place to live, and especially a better place for businesses to grow. Thank you so much. So this is a poem I wrote a little earlier as the poet laureate for the city, but I thought since we're thinking historically and thinking about who we were and who we are and who we can still be, I thought it would be appropriate. A story of the city. In the story, there is a city. It's streets straight as a grid, and in the east the hills, in the west the river. In the story, someone prays to a god though we don't know yet if it is a prayer of praise or a prayer for healing. So much depends on this. His back to us or hers, shoulders bent. We hear the murmur of it, the urgency. In the story, a man is packing up a box of things at a desk. A woman is sitting in a car outside the grocery as if she can't bring herself to go in, not yet. Or is the man unpacking, setting a photo of his family on the desk and claiming it? And is the woman writing a message to someone, her sister maybe, a friend? In the story, a child is reading, sunlight coming through the window. In the story, the trees are thicker and green. In the story, a child is reading, yes, and his father watches, uncertain about something. There is a mother, maybe an aunt, an uncle, another father. These things change each time we open the book. Start reading the story over. Sometimes a story about trees, sometimes about a city of light, the city beyond the windows of a dark pub, now lucent and glimmering. Or sometimes a story about a ghost, his clothes threaded with fatigue and smoke. You smell him as he enters the room and you wonder about that distant city he fled, soot shot, looking back and falling ash at the past. Sometimes it's a story about someone singing or someone signing a form or speaking before a crowd or shouting outside a building that looks important, if only for the flag there or the columns or the well-kept lawn. By now it's maybe your story and the child is your child or you. And maybe we're telling the story together as people do, sitting at a table in a warm room, the meal finished, the night dark, a candle lit, an empty cup left out for a profit, an empty chair maybe for a dead friend, a room filled with words, filled with voices, the living and the dead, someone telling the story about the people we are meant to be. Thank you. First, I do want to commend Sabrina for having this concept and making me personally think about what I think about the future of my community in 10 years. As someone who was born and bred in North Columbia off North Main Street and someone who still lives off of North Main Street, I realized that I personally did need to take a moment and contemplate my own vision for my community as opposed to being a specter, watching either its growth or sometimes even its demise. And this moment is also in line with scripture, I must say, as we are all familiar with the one that the Lord says to Habaka, write the vision and make it plain. So today, 10 things that I want to make plain that I see for 2029. First and foremost, to be clear, I am just excited about the future of North Columbia as I am about my own personal future as we all should be. And that same excitement, I believe, by then we'll have spread to the neighborhoods and the business community and result in the conglomerate of individuals as young as my daughter, who was at USC and as old as my grandmother, who's 95 at Inzer Forest, with various interests and goals who believe in their own individual ability to change their community for the better. Because although Mayor Benjamin will still be around in 2029 in his fifth term as mayor, I had to, I'm sorry. Private investment will increase such that there is less dependence on public funds for development and sustaining our neighborhoods and our businesses. And as private investment grows, I reflect back to my vision when I was at OBO with the city of Columbia. And our goal was to make sure we created economic opportunities for all people and not just a select few. So with that, it is my vision that minorities and minority owned businesses will also own buildings on the Northman quarter, not just rent space like my good friend called Solomon, who made an early move to the Northman Street and bet on the success of Northman Street many, many years ago. In 2029, it is my vision that my that parents will be more confident in the public educational system under Richland One and that it will provide their children with a quality education that will ensure that our children are competitive on a global level and not with just the next school district. And while I may be one of the very few people who enjoy General Soy Tofu from the China Wing basket on occasion, there will be some more restaurants and eateries along the quarter offering a wide range of options so that we don't have to drive too far for a healthy meal. And speaking of healthy meals, we will have at least one more grocery store offering quality produce and meats from local growers, maybe in the form of a cooperative, we'll see. And in addition to good food, North Columbia will find a way to disrupt, disrupt people's normal shopping patterns and develop a sustainable retail mix that meets the needs of the surrounding community while drawing others to come and see what North Columbia is all about. And most personal to me, I also see North Columbia having disruptive communities similar to the old days where doctors and lawyers live next door to everyday folks like truck drivers and secretaries so that people such as myself can be everyday role models to children who may not have a doctor or a lawyer in their home. And finally, in 2029, I will be able to get here quicker from my home because I will be able to enjoy a smooth ride down North Main Street because the streetscape will be complete. Thank you all. I'm Robin Waits. I'm the executive director with Historic Columbia and on behalf of the organization, I'm delighted to be here with you today as we celebrate the present and look forward to the future. This corridor holds such a rich and diverse history as well as great promise much of which has been spurred by this community's recognition of the power and opportunity in maintaining and capitalizing on the historic places that define this district. To celebrate these places and their unique stories, we worked with Sabrina, the North Columbia Business Association, Experience Columbia, One Columbia, to develop the Noma Robot Trail, which highlights 12 historic sites along the commercial corridor. And you will see it in your packet here. So take, for example, 2608 Main Street, which is just a couple of blocks north of here in 1947, roughly $8,000 bought this then very avant garde, streamlined, modern commercial building to upper Main Street. Originally, this trendy structure was home to the Stark Specialty Company, which applied customers with cool merchandise, such as vending machines and coin operated pool tables. For decades, it has also served the community and still does today as the appliance repair shop. Just across the street at 2327 Main Street, following a move from 1002 Gervais Street, where he operated since 1931, owner Thomas Salls welcomed, quote, the patronage of old customers and friends, unquote, at the opening of his new building in March of 1946. Salls maintained his general auto repair facility aptly named Salls Garage until his death in 1954. The building then became home to the auto electric exchange in 1962. And today, of course, Curiosity Coffee Shop serves up outstanding coffee and pastries and is a wonderful inclusive community gathering space. And here at 2428 Main Street, this building was constructed in October of 1937 when the Columbia City of Columbia issued a permit to contractor T.E. Moore, who completed this mid-sized commercial structure in 1938. It cost about $3,500. We don't want to ask Gretchen and her team what this building costs today. I don't think it's maybe the window, maybe a brick, $3,500. This new addition to Main Street served as the local headquarters of American News Company during the 1940s through the 1950s. And from the 60s through the 70s, it was home to Wilson upholstery, which specialized in automobile interiors. And today, of course, it's the headquarters for studios to L.R., who in addition to preserving this great award-winning site is adding significant new construction to the corridor. And that's so important in the development of these districts and these corridors is that you've got this conversation between historic places and new construction that really move us into the future. So each building that is featured on this trail serves as a catalyst for reinvestment and rejuvenation. Some through adaptive use have introduced unprecedented businesses to an area of Columbia whose evolution has been marked by residential and then later commercial growth during the later 19th and early 20th centuries. And Main Street north of Elmwood historically has meant many things to many people. It's been a vital source of employment, entertainment, services of all kinds and a link to the predominantly residential neighborhoods of Elmwood, Cottontown, Earlwood and of course Eau Claire. Thanks to the efforts of entrepreneurs and visionaries, NOMA stands as one of Columbia's most exciting destinations again. And in commemorating these remarkable achievements, we're proud to partner with NCBA to preserve history and cherish memories of the North Columbia community for the next 10 years. So following this morning's time capsule installation, we invite you on a journey with us to connect the history with the present day NOMA through our new historic sites trail that features these handmade ceramic robots that are hidden on a number of your most beloved local businesses. Design inspiration behind these unique mementos lies in the larger than life robots that adorn studio to LR, which again, we recognized several years ago as a historic preservation award for adaptive use. So today we're excited to celebrate this property and others that speak to the past, present and future character of this district. And as you walk through, if you have a chance to take the tour with us today and find those little ceramic robots, we are going to encourage you to take a picture with those robots at those buildings and tag NOMA Columbia, Historic Columbia, Columbia SC, City of Columbia with the hashtag NOMA robots so we can bring visibility to this really rich and growing community. Thank you all for being with us today and including us in this effort. Good morning. And represent the part I'm also excited about the revitalization of North Maine. I invested in North Maine years ago, well over 10 years ago, my law firm is right across from High Park and I live in college place. So I am fully invested in this area and I'm very excited and I also like to acknowledge that I'm the only electric fisher with the shortest presentation. So thank you. But truly, we want to thank everyone for coming out. I am truly excited about the future of North Columbia. I am truly excited about our ability to impact change in our community. I want to thank Sabrina Odom for her vision. This has been a labor of love for her. And I'm glad that everything came together perfectly. I want to thank our elected officials who are here and who have spoken. I want to thank our business owners and I want to thank the individuals of the community who have continued to support North Columbia. I'm excited about these little robots that I need to figure those out. We do have t-shirts for sale. And so thank you all for coming out. We appreciate your support from the North Columbia Business Association. Yeah, I just want to thank everybody for coming out. Gretchen Lambert, Trip Riley, and I bought this property about three years ago. The reason this day is significant for us, too, is because it's the day we moved into our building after we renovated it. I want to thank all these guys here today, ladies and gentlemen, from our elected officials that we couldn't have done this without them, without their support and their dedication to the infrastructure that's put in here that made it really attractive for us. The other thing that made it really attractive for us is this community, very diverse, very community-oriented. And I just want to thank everybody for the support that they've given us as a company here. So the one thing I want to say today is that we feel strongly about the North Maine Noma District. We're investing here. We think this is a great place to invest. There's lots of great businesses here already. A lot of people who have already done a lot of groundwork that we kind of come on those shirt tails to help develop and do more things here with the property we've got. This is a very small addition to Columbia, but we think it's an addition in the right place at the right time in the right community. We're going to do a quick thing. The other reason this date's important is because those cisterns were done for a reason. The day we moved into our offices was also the day we had the great studio to L.R. Flood. So we walked in that morning on our first day in our new offices to about four inches of water and mud. That happened about a year later, the same thing. So we said we have to do something. Gretcha Lambert came up with a great idea. Let's retrofit a couple of propane tanks. We got some great visionaries. Clark Ellison and Chris Steich here in Columbia that fabricated those fabulous cisterns. And what those cisterns do is they collect the first thousand gallons of water and then slowly release it so that we don't have those kind of issues again. So it's great. It's a functional piece of art. I love it. Gretcha's office is right there behind that. And you'll see a little sign back there. But it's great to see people just drive up, come and take a picture with the robots. And if you ask somebody around town, hey, do you know where the robots are? That's our offices. That's how they know where to come. So we're glad to be a part of this, a part of this community. And we look forward to let's put the time capsule in the girlbot.