Chamber Corner: Park District, Build a Business, Chamber Banquet, Fall Fest on Main

I hope everyone is doing well and enjoying their summer so far. We certainly got some summer temperatures this past week.

Although the regular Park District Activities have been cancelled this summer, they are doing a great job of coming up with new social distancing activities for our kids in the community. Last week my family had a great time Rock Painting. Great job to the Park District for their creative ways to give us something to look forward too.

It was fun seeing the submissions for our Build a Business Contest. We had entries for the Walnut Cafe, Walnut Library, Walnut Post Office, Fisch Motors Car Wash and The Walnut Leader. The Cafe design by Tim Funfsinn won 1st place with 102 votes and second place was Lukah Miller’s Fisch Motors Car Wash replica at 97 votes. They won gift cards to Avanti’s and Walnut Acres Country Stores. You can view these entries at facebook.com/walnutillinoischamberofcommerce. A Facebook account is not needed to view these submissions.

Some disappointing news to share. You may have already ready in The Walnut Leader that our Chamber Banquet for 2020 has been cancelled. We will honor this year’s award winners at next year’s Banquet scheduled for March 2021. We will also honor new award winners for 2021, so it will be 2 banquets packed into one night! For those that have paid their reservation, we will be contacting you and offering a refund. It’s sad we couldn’t have a Banquet this year, but the health and safety of our attendees is the top priority at this time.

With that said, as of right now, Walnut Fall Fest on Main is still going on as planned. We hope to still be able to put on our 5th annual event. There will be some changes, of course, but as of right now we are moving forward and planning will begin to ramp up in July. We will contact our local officials and health department for their advice, recommendations and expertise during the planning of the event as well.

As for upcoming events, we have a few things to look forward to. Walnut Garage Sales are this weekend! You can view the sale listings in this week’s Leader and also see items on the Walnut, Illinois Facebook page as people will be posting pictures of their items for sale in the official “Event”. To view the event, go to facebook.com/walnutillinoischamberofcommerce and click the events tab.

Also, on July 3rd, Working on Walnut’s Event Committee will still be holding their Patriotic Painting Party. I believe this is the only Walnut Days Event that is still going on as planned. The Painting Party will be held at Liberty Square from 5-7 p.m. and this year painting boards will be FREE. Join us that evening!

Finally, solo artist Jason Fletcher and Walnut native Jonny Barnas are re-uniting their band Bar Stock Black for one night only on Thursday, July 9th for a concert at Liberty Square. This is the first of many concerts to be held at “The Square”. This is exciting! Watch for restaurant promotions and other details soon.

I’m excited to say a lot is going on! Remember to shop Walnut whenever you can.