NORWICH – The Norwich Garden Club and the Norwich Business Improvement District (BID) are collaborating to promote, “Bring the Bloom to Broad” an annual downtown beautification initiative that adds hanging flower baskets throughout the city.

They are asking the community members to help sponsor the initiative this year, bringing it back to it's roots. Sponsor a basket for $43 until May 16.

The Norwich Garden Club, which dates back to 1932, started the tradition in the 1970s, manually hanging and maintaining the flowers baskets, then called buckets, throughout the season.

According to current Norwich Garden Club President Dr. Jane Coddington, the garden club members would even go up on ladders to dead-head the petunias to keep them looking nice. During that time they would fund raise for the initiative by asking the community to “adopt a basket,” as well as through hosting plant sales.

Eventually, the garden club began to collaborate with the BID, which was founded in 1982, on the beautification effort, helping to cover costs and getting the city more involved. The funding model moved toward the BID covering half of the costs of the baskets and the garden club covering the other half. Currently, and for the last few years, the City of Norwich has been responsible for hanging the baskets and watering the flowers using a motorized lift, while Pire's Flower Basket plants and grows the baskets rather than the garden club members.

Coddington relayed that Pire's has prepared the baskets for more than a decade, having the space to grow them initially and the expertise to recommend which flowers are best for the conditions hanging in the street.

“When you think about the conditions they hang in, they're completely exposed to the elements. They're high up surrounded by concrete and asphalt. So they help us and they recommend the plants that are going to work,” said Coddington.

In recent past year's they've hung purple and white petunias, but over time, they found that these do not continue to look their best after hanging for months. This year, according to Coddington, the flowers in the baskets will be red vinca vines with greenery, so expect them to look differently than the ones pictured.

“It's different than what we've done the last couple of years, but change is good,” said Coddington.

Director of the Norwich BID, Dana Wall, explained how given other initiatives the BID wants to accomplish this year, opening the hanging flower basket efforts for sponsorship from the public again, would be helpful for everyone.

“Fundraising and sponsorship always help with these kinds of things when organizations like us [the BID] and the Norwich Garden Club don't have really big budgets. But I think for me especially, I wanted to do something that would allow the community, the city, and the people who live here to feel engaged with downtown beautification efforts and contribute to what they want to see on the street,” said Wall.

According to Wall, the total estimated cost of the 68 baskets to be hung on lamp posts throughout the city this year is just under $3000, which she says is less than last year because they had to pay to replace the basket liners.

The cost to sponsor a basket is $43 and can be done in honor or memory of an individual, on behalf of your business/organization, or just because. You'll receive a handwritten acknowledgment of your sponsorship with a message to the loved one or a name of your loved one on the card. If sponsoring on behalf of a business/organization the BID will be publicly recognizing sponsorships throughout the season on social media, providing your organization with increased visibility.

To sponsor a basket fill out the form on the BID's website found at https://www.norwichbid.com/news and select the option to “Sponsor a Basket”. Afterwards, payment in the form of cash or check must be mailed or delivered to the BID at City Hall at 1 City Plaza, Norwich, NY 13815. Sponsorship and payments are accepted until May 16 when the BID's “Main Street Sweep” cleanup event is held.

“We've always paid for the hanging baskets and we've tried to fit into the BID's budget, but to my knowledge we hadn't sought sponsorships or donations for them for a long time, so I thought, why not just give it a try and see what happens,” said Wall, who expressed that this is her first year as director of the Norwich BID and she's trying to bring a new perspective and desire to collaborate more.

“We thought it would be fun if we in collaboration with them resurrected the 'adopt a basket' idea and did that because it's a nice way for people to all be part of beautifying downtown, and it's a way to support the project in ways we've done in the past,” said Coddington who relayed that they are about a third of the way to their sponsorship goal.

The Norwich Garden Club has a long history of supporting beautification efforts. They regularly maintain three flower beds downtown. One called the Memorial Garden located at the back of the library property, that is filled with pink roses and petunias. Another on the corner of Gordon Park between West Main Street and South Broad Street, that is crescent shaped, and one bed near the movie theater that holds a lot of perennials that should be blooming soon according to Coddington.

The garden club currently has 20 members, if you're interested in joining send an email to norwichgardenclubny@gmail.com. The club has a schedule of programs throughout the year. The next one being on May 20 at 6 p.m. called “Wild About Lavender: How to Grow and the Many Uses of Lavender” featuring guest speaker, Sally O'Malley of Little Farmhouse Lavender, to be held at the Chenango Arts Council Classroom at 27 W. Main Street.

The Norwich BID is one of the first BIDs to be founded in New York State. It's mission is “to make Downtown Norwich a thriving center of commerce by supporting its members and businesses, enhancing public spaces, and promoting cultural events to create a vibrant, welcoming community.” This year they are working towards further establishing the new downtown brand and logo. According to Wall, they've applied for grants for new light post banners as well as decals to beautify vacant storefronts, with the new downtown Norwich branding. Wall also mentioned that landscaping projects for beautification are in the planning phase, which would involve both actual landscaping and plantings, as well as cleaning up of sidewalks and public spaces, all related to getting the new downtown brand out.