Building owners say they want new mural

By Jack Mazurak
Staff Writer - The Daily Star

ONEONTA — James and Susan Kenny said they want to use their downtown building to support the community.

The Kennys, who own a brick building at the corner of Fairview and Main streets, tried unsuccessfully to get money from the Coca-Cola Co. to restore a vintage advertisement on the building.

Monday, they told the Oneonta Beautification Committee they would gladly let the Oneonta Farmers' Market paint a retro-style mural over the old ad.

"There's just no way that I'm going to provide advertising for Coca-Cola. It's just not going to happen," James Kenny said. "The farmers' market is about community. Coca-Cola is about soda."

The Coca-Cola ad faces south on the Fairview Street side of the Kennys' building.

Julie Carney, Beautification Committee liaison and Third Ward alderman, said the Kennys' building would be the first choice for a mural project.

Committee members voted to support a farmers' market mural, pending a final location and design.

Kathleen Frascatore, farmers' market manager, said there's a chance the group can get state matching funds to cover half the project's projected $5,800 cost. But with the application deadline a week away, she said, things must move quickly.

"The state periodically offers a round of funding to support farmers' markets," she said. "We approached an artist who does fantastic vintage style signs with a 1920s agriculture feel."

Frascatore said Cynthia Marsh, the artist, could redesign the market's emblem to give a brand identity and a lasting agricultural image.

City Clerk James Koury said the city collected $2,300 from private donors four years ago that could help support the project.

But Bob Brzozowski, president of the Greater Oneonta Historical Society, said in an e-mail to city officials and the Kennys that he and the board don't support painting over the Coca-Cola ad.

"(The Center for Agricultural Development and Entrepreneurship) and the farmers' market are assets to our community, but there are better locations for a farmers' market mural — for example, on the parking garage," Brzozowski wrote.

He said if state or federal money were used for the project, the state Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation Office would have to be notified.

Carney said both Koury and Susan Kenny had contacted Coca-Cola about getting restoration funding but had gotten no reply.

Frascatore said she would apply for the state grant without specifying a spot for the mural.

"I'm not opposed to it being on other locations," she said. "It was intend to be a vintage 1920s aesthetic, not a slick modern design."

James Kenny, who bought the building a year and a half ago, said he didn't know how old the Coca-Cola ad is, but he said the building was put up in 1923.