In the past few months we’ve re-built our board, cleaned up our books, planned many new programs, instituted a few new programs, hired an Interim Executive Director, and hired a couple summer interns.  We hope we’ve started to build our reputation as a strong non-profit leading Dupont residents to rally around their business community and thereby build that business community for all.

We received a grant from DC’s Department of Small, Local, and Disadvantaged Business (DSLDB) for twice the usual amount. Seventy percent of that goes to programs and thirty percent to overhead costs. We’ll shortly get a Clean Team grant from DSLDB that will put those blue-shirted workers out on our streets cleaning our commercial corridors.  We’ll also have a couple Clean Team staffers doing landscaping and watering trees this summer. We’ve applied for a Vibrant Streets grant from the DC Office of Planning. With funding secured and operations running more smoothly, we’re close to hiring a really dynamic, experienced, permanent Executive Director.

Accomplishments this year:

• We got the grants
• Did 20 Business Assessments
• Completed 3 Façade Improvement Projects
• Advertisements featuring Dupont businesses on WMATA busses and in bus shelters

Goals for the next few months:

• Improve 6 business facades
• Give Technical Assistance to 6 businesses
• Do 10 more Business Assessments
• Do more bus ads
• Hold a Taste of 18th Street
• Hang light pole banners promoting Dupont Circle business
• Promote our locovore businesses (Glen’s Garden Market, the Farmers Market, Norah’s, etc)
• Promote First Friday
• Study with the Dupont Circle Village how the business community can better serve our elder population
• Promote movie nights, 17th Street Festival, Gay Pride, and the High Heel Race
• And many internal goals like surveying the business and property inventory

Longer term plans:

• Hold more Tastes of Dupont by street
• Build membership support
• Hold a silent auction and more events
• Beautify the neighborhood
• Improve the Public Safety
• Recruit and help retain local business
• There are too many cross promotion possibilities to mention

We’ll check back in with you a few months to update you on our achieving these goals. With your guidance and support we believe you’ll have a partner who you can invest in. Thank you.

Check the Dupont Festival Facebook page for details.

Come and celebrate the 26th running of the High Heel Race! Tuesday, October 30, 2012. 17th Street, NW between Riggs Place and P Street closes at 6 pm, strolling and costume parade begins shortly thereafter, and the Race starts at 9 pm sharp, running north to south. Get there early!

If you’d like to join us in the VIP Area, please buy tickets from Paypal below (you don’t need a Paypal account) and follow the instructions that pop up after you purchase for instructions on how to get Will Call tickets.

We’re going to completely re-brand, re-boot, and re-build Dupont Main Streets over the next couple months and hope to hire a new ED in January. We’re now wrapping up the FY 2012 reporting with our primary funding source, DSLDB (DC government’s Department of Small and Local Business Development),and are beginning budgeting for 2013.

That’s where we hope you come in. We want to know what we could do this year to earn your respect. We have to submit our funding plans to DSLDB in the next 2 weeks and we’d like to know where you would like us to concentrate.

We’ll share our 2013 goals with the community when they are finalized and will report our progress and success rate in hitting those goals. This page lays out the intended structure of our projects.

DUPONT FESTIVAL and THE U.S CHESS CENTER present CHESS IN THE CIRCLE

In celebration of National Chess Day, Senior Chess Master Gregory Acholonu and other staff from the U.S. Chess Center will be on hand to play and teach in Dupont Circle from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Sunday Oct 14th Come out and enjoy an afternoon of chess in the park!

Sponsored by The Board Room, and in honor of National Chess Day, Senior Life Chess Master Gregory Acholonu and other staff from the U.S. Chess Center will be on hand to play, teach, and facilitate chess in the park.

Come out and enjoy an afternoon of chess in the park!  Bring the kids!

About the U.S. Chess Center:  For more than twenty years, the U.S. Chess Center has worked to help children in D.C. public schools improve academic performance and develop social skills through chess. During that time, the organization has taught approximately 30,000 students the rules, strategy, etiquette, and discipline of the game.

You can support events like these by going to the Dupont Festival website. Event Flyer.

Please join us if you can.

Here you will find information about who we are, what we do, and how we can better serve you. If you have any questions or suggestions please do not hesitate to click on the contact button to the left of the screen.