Carson Perspective: Flame hopes to see downtown Carson City jump ‘n jive

Flame is burning to turn downtown Carson City into a red-hot destination point.

Whether she will succeed depends on more than her just passion, which is the way of the world, but success or the lack of it won’t ensue because she didn’t try. Flame is the nickname for Dana Lee Freund, president of the Downtown 20/20 organization that seeks to make “old town” into a new/old downtown via revitalization.

This 50-something grandmother of Scots-Irish heritage has red hair, a temper she says she keeps well under control, and a drive to make her adopted community work. She happens to be on the side that wants a two-lane Carson Street downtown, but she looks beyond that to forging an alliance that aims to makes it work via events and revival of business.

She credits Doreen Mack as the 20/20 founder and Linda Ritter, the group’s volunteer consultant, but spreads the credit for the new activist group to all involved.

“We’ve been able to go forward with this in such a short amount of time because of the talented people in this community,” she said. “This” is not only the organization, but a plan drafted to take before the Board of Supervisors later this summer.

The Southern California native moved to Nevada and lived in Caliente for 28 years before moving to Carson City in 2007. She was an emergency medical technician and then a firefighter back in those days.

Now executive marketing director for a two-person business doing social media public relations and related work for clients, she is a longtime motorcycle enthusiast. She has written and published a handbook on Silver State tourism: “Irish Flame’s Biker & Travel Guide to Nevada.”

Now, a couple of other business-related notes.

Stan Jones, immediate past Chamber of Commerce chair, basked in sunlight at the Carson Farmer’s Market. He expressed joy at hearing the vacant Gottschalks space at Carson Mall will get a new tenant, but lamented the recent lost decade.

The time value of money is key to business. But time passes whether money passes through hands or doesn’t for a while. Such business cycles never end. But Jones is correct to celebrate that the recovery end of this cycle seems at hand.

Speaking of recovery, word reached this scrivener that someone decried questions being raised in this space about re-establishing a city Community Development Department. In part, it is the business of newspapers to raise questions, yet newspapers don’t oppose development in knee-jerk fashion. Robust communities usually mean robust newspapers.

But questions are the lifeblood of community dialogue.

John Barrette covers Carson City government and business. He can be reached at jbarrette@nevadaappeal.com.