Dear Editor,
Did you attend the First Friday event Aug 1? Check around, ask those who did and look at the photo attached.
Have you ever seen a more egregious display of wanton, intentional, obstructionism/isolationism of a business, a member of the Kingman Downtown Merchants Association, at an event anywhere, at any time?
President of our dues-paying Chamber of Commerce intentionally parked vehicles so as to block off and close Beale Street mid-block, just before the Thunder-Rode Shop. She, Chamber of Commerce president, intentionally left Beale Street, from mid-block up to First Street, with no vendors or music for the first Friday event. Can you agree that this wanton act was truly horrendous? If I was an event coordinator/manager in any town anywhere on planet Earth I would never ever do what was done on Beale Street between first and second – just a disgusting display of arrogance and deceit. By parking two giant trucks the way she did, (one was a big rig), First Friday visitors were deceived into believing that that was the end of the line, the end of the event, where those two trucks were stretched out into the middle of the road. We stood there and watched people get to that point and turn around and go back to uptown Beale Street.
Why wouldn’t the vendors be distributed evenly up and down Beale Street starting at First Street all the way down to Sixth Street unless, as was the case this time, the Chillin’ on Beale cars were occupying Fifth to Sixth Streets or sometimes, First to Second Streets?
How about trying that little trick down at Rickety Cricket? Why don’t you stretch a couple of big rigs across the street down there just before their businesses, virtually blocking them off, and see how they like it?
You may not like our politics or our America First position, but your actions as Chamber of Commerce president and First Friday and First Friday Committee and volunteers, have taken our beautiful downtown Kingman to a new level of abject bigotry on steroids.
Did anyone from the Chamber, from the First Friday committee or any of the volunteers come down to our shop and apologize or even offer an explanation? No, they did not. Had this not been an intentional act of obstructionism and isolationism, surely, the president or one of her minions would have come down to Thunder-Rode and offered an explanation or an apology. But no, they did not.
Am I whining or crying because we were, once again, excluded from the First Friday event? No, I’m not, we had a great time at the corner of First and Beale, two live bands, featuring Heart Rock with Ben & Sherry, free Thunder, cones distributed and a five-minute comfort dog session with popcorn for those who needed it. No, not whining or crying, just angry that our Chamber, which charges $50 for a vendor setup, seeks thousands of dollars in sponsor donations and more would pull off a stunt like what we saw at First Friday, Aug. 1.
Jack Alexander
Thunder-Rode
