Sugar Loaf, N.Y. – August 3, 2015 – The Orange County Citizens Foundation has organized another Placemaking Tour in Cornwall, N.Y. for Tuesday, Sept. 1 from 5 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. The tour will give Hudson Valley citizens, community leaders, activists, and planning and zoning board members the opportunity to learn more about creating quality places in their own communities.

Placemaking is an approach that inspires people to create and improve the public places that become the hearts of every community. Rooted in community-based participation, placemaking helps citizens transform their public spaces to enhance local assets, spur rejuvenation, and serve common needs. Placemaking is both an overarching idea and a hands-on tool for improving neighborhoods, cities, towns, villages, and entire regions. Placemaking can start small, with achievable improvements that immediately bring benefit to public spaces and the people who use them.

“The goal of these tours is to inspire participants to enhance and improve their own communities by sharing with them the successes of another,” said Nancy Proyect, president of the Orange County Citizens Foundation. “The Cornwall event will help people better understand what placemaking is and the benefits it can yield, while giving them the tools and connections to help facilitate revitalization in their own communities.”

The guided walking tour – which starts and ends at the Cornwall Public Library, located at 395 Hudson Street in Cornwall, will feature presentations by community, business, and government officials about successes and challenges in the Cornwall community.

The program includes:

• Pre-tour presentations
• Guided walking tour
• Wrap-up discussion

There is no charge for this event and the public is invited to attend. The Citizens Foundation will offer two hours of continuing education for municipal board members. The excursion will be held rain or shine.

In the past, the Citizens Foundation has held placemaking tours of Tuxedo, Montgomery, Middletown, Beacon, Goshen, Monroe, Sugar Loaf, Walden, and Warwick, as well as Ramsey, N.J. and Milford, Pa.

For more information, to sponsor, or to register, contact the Orange County Citizens Foundation at 845.469.9459 or info@occitizensfoundation.org. You may also learn more about the Foundation’s Placemaking Initiative online here.