Cheers to three new Yo efforts

Dennis Schiraldi and DOYO.

Adrienne and Jon Howell and Faces of our Future.

RJ Thompson and City of You.

Over the course of the past several years, those are not legacy names and programs associated with Valley action, let alone positive Valley action.

Yet in recent months, they have been.

And this week, they were all front and center – successfully adding to a positive city vibe.

DOYO, City of You and Faces of our Future have floated around various media forms the past couple of months.

Thursday and Friday, it was showtime for each, and each earned gold medals all around for the people above, their colleagues and supporters and the Valley overall.

Schiraldi brought DOYO Live into being Thursday with 200-plus professionals huddled for the marketing and digital content conference.

I have long been a believer the past few years – watching shale shift to make – that a “smart” conference of this kind more commonly hosted in larger or tech-based cities could happen here.

DOYO was such.

Schiraldi delivered, and not without hurdles typical of any startup. The self-professed “5-foot-nothing-basketballer” juked and jived like a point guard for 15-hour days to bridge and spackle this thing together.

It was special to see him on the stage Thursday morning at Youngstown State University launching DOYO before a packed auditorium including the Bruce Springsteen of marketing in the front row as the keynote speaker.

A glance over the crowd showed faces eager for change – a fresh pivot from 200 people gathered for angry park board meetings.

Of all the rewarding bits from DOYO, one is that faces from North Carolina, California and Canada made the trip here – to Youngstown.

Said Schiraldi:

“[We wanted to] help stimulate the economy by bringing 200 people to the Williamson College of Business. Show this place off. Go to lunch at a restaurant downtown. Hire a couple of people. Freelance some work out. We’re very committed to that.”

With the DOYO glow still showing, Friday came with Howell and Thompson showcasing their ventures.

City of You is a rebranding campaign driven by Thompson and his students at YSU in partnership with the city of Youngstown and funded by a federal grant.

It officially launched Friday night at the M Gallery at Erie Terminal in downtown Youngstown. The exhibit will be open to the public as it showcases a series of images and podcasts of city residents reflecting the positives of the city. New podcasts will be added every few weeks throughout the showing.

“The spirit of the campaign [that made the exhibit possible] is all about people who live, learn, work and play here,” said Thompson in our paper.

Building up to Thompson’s Friday evening event was Howell.

He is a one-man tour-de-force of positivity.

Well, and one woman: his wife, Adrienne.

They are city natives who’ve been in Illinois for years. But they are in the preseason of their city efforts, with their full season set to begin when Jon retires in a few years. They already own a Youngstown home.

Earlier Friday, they gathered a diverse group of 75 millennials age 21 to 35 who spend time improving the city’s quality of life.

He called the rallying effort “Faces of our Future” to organize and spotlight the actions of diverse young professionals.

Jon and Adrienne have been doing pop-up city ventures for a few years.

On Sept. 2-3, they will restart Operation Paint Brush – a volunteer effort to paint a few city homes for those in need. It was originally last spring, but was rained out. Typical of the two, when the rains came in May, there was no backing up; just adjusting and doing. Find Jon on Facebook if you want to join his effort.

That all three events happened together is not a coincidence and showcases the collaboration that will be needed to make the city right.

No one person can make the change, regardless of what Donald Trump professes. At Thursday’s event by Schiraldi, there was Thompson presenting. At Friday’s event, Thompson and the Howells were partnered up. On all of their social media, each was pushing the other.

They demonstrate the optimism and partnership needed.

What I think is important about all three ventures is that they involve action and participation. They convey a “do” and a “next.”

“City of You” could just be another slogan for another city renewal campaign forged in a three-ring binder. It is not. It is message, meaning and motivation, thus giving it movement.

Schiraldi looks, too, at his event as a first step. Stay tuned for what this could be.

And the Howells are just fun to watch as they chip away at project after project.

And this week, they came to play together and ensure that they bring others – many, many others – into the game.

Congrats.

Todd Franko is editor of The Vindicator. He likes emails about stories and our newspaper. Email him at tfranko@vindy.com. He blogs, too, on vindy.com. Tweet him, too, at @tfranko.