A street festival Thursday evening helped usher in the website www.greenwoodms.com, which combines six separate and distinct entities in a single location.
The festival, which began at 6:30 p.m., was preceded by a more limited unveiling to board members of the participating organizations as well as city and county leaders.
The website serves as the “landing page” for:
• The Greenwood-Leflore-Carroll Economic Development Foundation
• The Greenwood-Leflore County Chamber of Commerce
• Main Street Greenwood Inc.
• The Greenwood Convention and Visitors Bureau
• The city of Greenwood
nLeflore County government
Greenwood City Council President Ronnie Stevenson said the website was fantastic.
“You’ve got so many links to go to. You can go to one website, and you can go to anything you want to know about Greenwood,” he said.
Others also shared that view.
“I went on the website today. To combine all of those websites is great,” said Gene Stansel, a former executive with Staplcotn.
Stansel said the new site helps to promote Greenwood and Leflore County to prospective industries.
Angela Curry, executive director of the Greenwood-Leflore-Carroll Economic Development Foundation, and Bill Crump, the foundation’s chairman, said the preview with board members went well.
“I’m hoping the community is going to give us the same reaction,” Crump said.
The effort to develop the unified site was made possible by a $150,000 grant from the Walton Family Foundation, which was administered by the Foundation for the Mid South.
Thursday’s launch was “like Christmas,” according to Brantley Snipes, executive director of Main Street Greenwood Inc.
She said all the entities worked together on the project.
“That tells you what a unique project it is. A lot of communities don’t have anything like it,” Snipes said.
Beth Stevens, executive director of the Greenwood-Leflore County Chamber of Commerce, said the site will offer something for everyone.
“People will be amazed,” she said.
Greenwood City Council member Carl Palmer said he was impressed by what he saw Thursday night.
“Anything you want to know about Greenwood, it is going to be on that website. I think it is one of the best websites I’ve ever seen concerning cities and counties,” he said.
Ben Muldrow of Arnette Muldrow and Associates, who helped with the marketing of the site, said the city and county are fortunate.
“I don’t know of any city that has a site this comprehensive,” she said. “I’ve worked in over 300 cities in 28 states. I’ve never seen something as good as this.”
Thursday’s event offered the possibility of some lucky person winning an iPad. Bob Rendel, an engineer with Viking Range Corp., took the prize home.
• Contact Bob Darden at 581-7239 or bdarden@gwcommonwealth.com.
