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Local suggests “image maker” for city
• Florida's "Possum Day" used as example
Wednesday,
August 25, 2010
August 7, or the first Saturday of every August, was declared “Possum Day” by the Florida Legislature in 1982. In fact, the City of Wassau, Florida celebrates the day every year with their Annual Possum Festival & Funday complete with parade, outdoor activities and various tributes to the great North American Opossum.
Margate Resident, Robert Perkis, suggested a similar day to Margate City Commissioners last week, a day with the polarizing uniqueness of Possum Day to put Margate on the map.
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As a Margate resident, Perkis participates in city government by regularly attending City Commission meetings and utilizing his three minutes of “public speak” granted to residents to impart ideas and critiques to city officials. He often speaks to zoning and land use issues on the agenda and, as loyal taxpayer and resident, wants to see his city thrive.
At last week’s City Commission meeting, Perkis used Wassau’s Possum Day as an example of what city officials might use as a starting point for dialogue in promoting Margate’s City Center.
A master developer was recently engaged in negotiations for the City Center project and Perkis thinks now is a good time to start promoting Margate nationwide.
Perkis told commissioners that the city could build the greatest downtown in the world, but if nobody knows about it, “nobody is going to come.”
“Margate needs something that goes beyond the borders of Margate; beyond the borders of Broward and maybe even the state to get people to come to Margate and spend money,” Perkis said.
Perkis is a strong supporter of economic development in the city and of the Margate Community Redevelopment Agency vision for Downtown. He suggested involving the City Planner in brainstorming ideas and the fostering of partnerships with the travel industry and local tourism bureaus.
Perkis’ ideas were well received by Margate Commissioners, David McLean and Joe Varsallone. His stuffed opossum got everyone in city chambers to smile for the moment.
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In Chipley FL, which is the self-proclaimed Possum Capital of the U.S., there is an engraved bronze plaque commemorating the possum. It seems that during the depression when there was little to eat the abundance of possum in the vicinity allowed people to survive.
In Wassau, a monument dedicated to the opossum reads: Erected in grateful recognition of the role the North American possum, a magnificient survivor of the marsupial family pre-dating the ages of the mastodon and the dinosaur has played in furnishing both food and fur for the early settlers and their successors. Their presence here has provided a source of nutritious and flavorful food in normal times and has been important aid to human survival in times of distress and critical need.
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