A Plan for a Brand: Mayor Kennedy Considers Marketing Campaign for the City

Mayor Judith Flanagan Kennedy is pictured with Lynn Area Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Leslie Gould and Chamber members at a breakfast Friday at Gannon Golf Course.

Mayor Judith Flanagan Kennedy announced at a Lynn Area Chamber of Commerce breakfast Friday that the city is considering a new branding and marketing campaign for the city.

“I was approached a couple of weeks ago by the EDIC who brought this really incredible branding/marketing campaign that somebody had devised as part of a college marketing project at Suffolk University,” said Kennedy.

Leslie Gould, executive director of the LACC who has seen some of the marketing materials, endorsed the campaign, replying, “Totally thumbs up” when the mayor asked what she thought of the proposal.

Flanagan said her office is currently working with the Suffolk student who designed the campaign.

“We want to see if we might be able to adapt that campaign for the city of Lynn,” said Kennedy. “It’s really comprehensive. It even turns our city logo [into something new]. It’s open to interpretation. But the whole design has been done so very well that we would like to adopt it. And if we can adopt it, you’ll start to see some of the changes in the ‘Welcome to Lynn’ signs, in the street signs, and by way of banners in the downtown area. I’m really hoping that we’ll be able to pull something together with this student to get this done.”

In another announcement, the mayor said that the city has finished Fiscal Year 2010 with $7.7 million in free cash.

“That’s one of the biggest infusions of free cash that we have had in the city in many years,” said Kennedy. “I’m the type of person who would rather save for a rainy day than go ahead and spend. So if you haven’t seen me hiring those 20 new police officers with that $7.7 million, I know that that’s a one-time source of revenue and I’m not going to put it into something that is going to be a recurring expense for the city.”

Kennedy said the free cash has come in handy for repairs following two major storms – about $170,000 for two classrooms at the Sisson School, and $115,000 for light poles at local baseball fields.

“I want to say we’ve been able to enter Fiscal year 2012 with no layoffs,” said Kennedy. “Even with the state aid cuts we’ve had to endure, there will be no layoffs in the city of Lynn. That will enable us to continue the public services that we’ve giving to you and allow us to continue the improve the state of the city.”

The mayor also addressed other topics in her speech, including public safety.

“I have said repeatedly that public safety needed to be addressed before anything else could even start to be addressed – because if people don’t feel safe here and the businesses don’t feel safe – then no matter what we do with the city as far as improving the economic climate, if we don’t have anybody that will come in and utilize it, then we’ve failed in our mission.”

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