Members of Advantage Watertown are preparing for their meeting with the City Council after some council members questioned in March how and why the group was formed.

As part of their monthly meeting Thursday, Advantage Watertown members planned what they wanted to talk about with the council. The joint meeting is scheduled tentatively for June 25.

Chairman John K. Bartow Jr. told members Thursday that they should discuss the group’s history, types of issues and projects it has been interested in and what priorities it should focus on in the future.

“I think we should tell them what we’re doing and get their input,” he said.

The group of business and community leaders meets every month to brainstorm about topics such as parking, housing and other downtown issues.

In April, Mr. Bartow promised Advantage Watertown would meet with the City Council after council members Jeffrey M. Smith and Roxanne M. Burns questioned what role the group should play in deciding city issues.

They wondered why the group, which appoints its own members and has no official designation by the city, should be involved in such activities.

In 2004, the group came about as a result of combining three other city committees: the Downtown Development Committee and steering committees for the Local Waterfront Revitalization Program and Quality Communities demonstration project.

Thousands of readers like you have made Northern New York Newspapers the number one ranked website* for local news and sports coverage in the north country.

You can continue on to this article in a few seconds, or you can visit one of our websites:

• Watertown Daily Times
• The Ogdensburg Journal
• Daily Courier-Observer