To: Rakesh Kumar 12/29/11
Re: 63 East Main Street
FBAC Mural Project
Dear Mr. Kumar,
Thank you for your generous tax-deductible donation to the Freehold Borough Arts Council. Your support to the community mural project has resulted in a much talked about statewide cultural event. More importantly, it is a source of community pride for those residents and local students who helped create the mural as well as for the numerous local businesses and government agencies that have backed the project.
The Arts Council is supportive of your efforts in locating a new business at 63 East Main Street. One of our primary missions is to drive commerce into town by making Freehold a cultural destination for the arts. The mural’s intent is to draw attention to that mission by attracting visitors and therefore, more business to the Borough. With over 18,000 vehicles a day passing the site, we hope that any business will take advantage of the high visibility and unique marketing value the mural has to offer. Retaining the mural at this location represents good will towards our community and shows a commitment to art appreciation and culture. If the building at 63 East Main Street must be demolished, in part or total, for a new business venture, we ask that you offer us an opportunity to work with you in figuring out an amiable way forward to help save and preserve as much of the artwork as possible so that others may continue to enjoy it. If a new building is to be constructed, we would like to speak with those involved about providing public art on the site.
As I indicated in the opening of this letter, your continued contribution is tax deductible since the FBAC is a not-for-profit 501(c)3 charity.
Please help preserve the mural by considering our request to keep it in tact within the site. The mural's presence signifies a historic new partnership between private business and public art in Freehold Borough.
I thank you for your time and look forward to our continued efforts in attracting arts and business to our hometown.
Sincerely,
Neal Girandola
President - FBAC
The only contact we received since this letter was on Wednesday 1/3/12 requesting to meet at the site on Saturday 1/7/12 at 10 am to discuss preservation scenarios. On Friday 1/6/12 Kumar had the mural painted over.