Robbinsville – The local revitalization organization REVVED UP gave its pitch for two possible murals for downtown Robbinsville to the Graham County Board of Commissioners at its March 16 meeting.
The organization is pushing for two murals to be painted in downtown Robbinsville – with the backing of the county and town, as well as their respective tourism authorities. The county held off on approving REVVED UP’s $10,000 ask to examine its finances further before making a decision.
At its March meeting, the Robbinsville Board of Aldermen approved REVVED UP’s ask, pending the other entities’ support.
One mural would be an abstract mountain scene, while the other would be of country music singer and Robbinsville native Ronnie Milsap.
The Milsap mural would be painted by artist Scott Nurkin and would be part of a statewide series of murals featuring North Carolina Musicians in their hometowns.
The mountain scene would go on the side of the Lovelace Building and the Milsap mural would go on the side of the Co-Op building.
“I have a little thing here from the tourism board, and their strategic plan is to motivate and increase overnight visitation and build the town into a destination for the entire county and embrace public relations in a cost effective means, like promoting the town as destination,” Colwell said.
As he did in his presentation to the aldermen, he said that the murals would also longer than a billboard, at a lower cost. The murals are part of REVVED UP’s proposed Music and Arts Mutual Agreement, which would also include a music festival and car show sometime in the fall.
REVVED UP plans to invite Milsap to perform at the festival.
“We have a spreadsheet that has everybody in the county that has a musical talent, where they play, who they play with, what kind of instruments they play, and we want to have a contest at this mountain music festival,” Colwell said. “We want to, at the same time, have a car and motorcycle show.”
He said for all of its plans – including the murals and the festival – the group needs $40,000, and is asking the four entities for the funds. He also said there was a possibility of grant funds defraying at least some of the mural costs.
“That will give you basically two big billboards that will be up for 10 years,” Colwell said.
He said two billboards would cost the town $63,500 for the same amount of time the murals would be guaranteed for.
“One of the things these towns do is they put murals everywhere,” Colwell said. “That helps bring people into their downtown area.”