Union Square Main Streets Executive Director

Mimi Graney

By CHRISTINE LIU

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It seems to me that almost every installment of the Union Square Main Streets email newsletter spawns never-ending items of a new quirky boutique, a restaurant renovation or a so-crazy-it-might-work art event. Who's back there pulling the strings so that businesses thrive in previously vacant industrial spaces, or so anyone can sell their produce at the "grown in Somerville" booth at the successful weekly farmers market?

Turns out it's Mimi Graney, executive director ("It's a fancy way of saying I'm the only one who works in the office") of three-and-a-half years (since its inception) at Union Square Main Streets (USMS). As the sole full-time staff member, Graney coordinates the four branches of the Main Streets model: design (development of the streetscape), organization (funding and management), promotion (ongoing events) and economic restructuring (fostering local businesses).

"I'm a real Somerville kind of gal," confesses bespectacled Graney, sporting her "What the Fluff?" (the 'mallow crème was invented here in 1917) shirt and bright-red bob, having lived in the neighborhood around 20 years. A Wellesley graduate, she was "doing homeless work for a long time"; in the late '80s, she co-published Street Magazine, a homeless-empowerment publication, which later evolved to what we know now as Spare Change newspaper, for which Graney did grant writing. Her next social initiatives included fighting domestic violence at Transition House in Cambridge, and producing about "every kind of show" on Somerville Community Access Television (SCAT)—from a "Soul Train for 10 year olds" to word-on-the-street philosophical interviews. Graney, seemingly ever restless, got her Master of Theological Studies degree at Weston Jesuit School of Theology, where she "loved understanding the common language of faith; how people commonly relate to God and the world."

In addition to current USMS promotions, like the weekly Saturday farmers market ("half a million dollars of economic impact," according to Graney), various events using "arts as an economic engine to revitalize the neighborhood" in conjunction with the Somerville Arts Council and the third annual What the Fluff Festival, slated for September 27th, the metamorphosis of Somerville's commerce is nothing less than significant. "Part of what makes this city exciting is that things are constantly evolving," says Graney. "Places coming and going—that's what makes it alive and growing."

Momentum is truly infectious, with local individuals following suit to constantly redefine the community. "There's a sense of participation," Graney says encouragingly. "'Put on a demo! Sell your vegetables! Coordinate your own market!' When you get people actively involved, we're all co-creators in making the neighborhood."

[Union Square Main Streets, P.O. Box 1, Somerville. 617.623.1392 x119. unionsquaremain.org]