Photo by: Wesley Hyde
On March 14, the City of Montevallo hosted the third annual “Love Montevallo Day” event.
“It’s an event meant to celebrate our collected accomplishments as a community,” said Montevallo’s mayor, Dr. Hollie Cost.
Mayor Cost also stated that the purpose of this year’s celebration was primarily to highlight private investment and businesses in Montevallo, as well as Montevallo’s artists.
The gathering was held at the small shopping center across from the Montevallo Fire Department. The event mainly consisted of multiple booths and was accompanied by live music.
Assistant to the Mayor Maggie Benson was credited as the primary organizer for the event.
The booths consisted of community organizations and a few vendors. One of the booths was from the Shelby County Complete Census Committee. The committee’s booth consisted of three members and two laptops with the county’s census website open. Attendees who completed their census would be entered in a raffle to receive a prize basket from the booth.
Committee member Savanah Kitchens stated that the main goal of the booth was to provide citizens who might not have internet access with the ability to fill the census out online. They found this particularly important since the census holds weight over county funding and stated that they had been holding similar raffles around the county, most notably in libraries.
Kitchens also stated that the raffle being held at Love Montevallo Day would be the last raffle until at least April 15 due to many of the venues they would have used closing because of the coronavirus.
Another organization attending the event was Impact, a community group whose primary focus is youth substance abuse prevention. The representative who attended stated their primary goal for their attendance at Love Montevallo Day was to spread awareness for their multilingual programs.
Another group attending was Montevallo Main Street, a volunteer group in Montevallo built around the city’s history and cultural significance to build up and promote the Main Street district. Montevallo Main Street’s director, Courtney Bennett, stated the organization attended to help promote the group and because they had helped set up the event.
Parked nearby was a food truck owned by Slice pizzeria .
Wesley Hyde is the digital media manager of the Alabamian. He is a senior Mass Communications major focusing on broadcast and production. He enjoys online gaming with friends, and listening to podcasts.
