Batavia 'branding' effort put on hold

Batavia aldermen are holding off on deciding whether the city should brand and market itself until they write a new strategic plan for the city.

Tuesday's discussion showed aldermen are confused about whether they are supposed to be picking a new city logo/seal, undertaking a marketing campaign or what.

"If we're not putting it (a new logo) on our business cards, we are spending a lot of money on a marketing campaign," Alderman Scott Salvati said, after learning a logo a consultant designed would not be used on city stationery, vehicles or business cards.

Officials were looking at artwork of a rainbow-colored stylized windmill made up of people shapes, with a tagline of "Batavia - Powered by Neighbors." It was developed by Sparc Inc., which the city hired in 2017 to develop a branding campaign, at a cost not to exceed $50,000.

Aldermen decided they should figure out how they would use the design and whether the Batavia "brand" the consultant suggested is what they want. And that's where the new strategic plan, the next item on their agenda, ties in.

Batavia's current strategic plan is at least six years old and hasn't been updated since 2014. The city was going to hire a consultant to help develop a new one but stopped that when it found out it would be losing sales tax revenue with the closing of the Sam's Club store.

Instead, the city administrator is leading the exercise.

On Tuesday, aldermen agreed to devote three committee meetings to work on the plan, including discussing the city's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. The dates have not been announced.

Newman said the current plan had "laudable goals" but was not specific enough about how to accomplish them.

She also said she wants the plan finished by August, so city department heads can use it as they begin developing the 2019 budget.

The current plan is a four-page document with 40 goals that address service reliability and financial responsibility, business development and retention, housing, environmental identity, downtown development, and community connectivity.

Alderman Marty Callahan suggested the city try to survey residents before writing a new plan, since it hasn't done one since 2010. "What are the residents concerned about?" he said. "I think we are going off a lot of old data."