Bloggers promote Fairfield tourism

FAIRFIELD – Visit Fairfield Iowa, the city’s tourism office, has enlisted a team of bloggers to write monthly articles on what they love about Fairfield, from its outdoor fun to its restaurant scene to its culture.

The writers will submit their articles to Visit Fairfield Iowa’s blog at VisitFairfieldIowa.com/blog. Visit Fairfield Iowa Director Terry Baker said she put out a call for community bloggers to contribute pieces to the site, and 10 people have stepped up to offer their writing talents and insider information.

The bloggers run the gamut from native Fairfield residents to those who just moved here, from a young professional to someone looking for family-focused activities.

“We’re excited for our first group of bloggers,” Baker said. “Not only are they an enthusiastic group, they represent a wide variety of interests and demographics.”

Baker said the bloggers will be able to tell the story of Fairfield better than simply a list of businesses. She said visitors want to know about what they will experience once they come, the kind of people they will meet, where they should eat lunch and where they can have fun.

“We’re excited for the depth of information this program will provide our visitors,” Baker said.

The bloggers will begin submitting content to the website in May. Baker said each blogger has committed to writing 10 blog posts a year.

The bloggers and the topics they will write about are:

• Travis West moved here from California in September and plans to write about disc golf, biking, summer-blooming plants and games in general.

• Chris Evergreen hopes to write about earth-friendly events in town, cool nature spots and local sustainability measures.

• Donna Cronce wants to push seniors to be more active, which is something she’s become passionate about after turning 60. She wants to write about the food and wine scene.

• Cheryl Fusco Johnson is turning 70 this month and has spent the last year in hibernation shielding herself from COVID-19. She saw blogging for the tourism office as a chance to push herself into the community by meeting musicians, entrepreneurs and others with an exciting story to tell.

• Devin Oberg was raised in Las Vegas, so she hopes to find a way to attract city folks to a small town like Fairfield. She said Fairfield feels like a “mini-Vegas” because of its live music scene. She plans to write about sustainability.

• Ashlyn Allsup will blog about what Fairfield can offer young people. She hopes to feature those parts of the city that might otherwise get overlooked but which would be of interest to the youth. “I want people to know their options,” she said.

• Marylou LaRose said she just wants to write “fun stuff.” She is a prolific letter-writer, sending them to everyone she knows. “I was a postal worker for 30 years, so it was really just self-preservation,” she joked.

• Jessica Hatchette lived in Washington, D.C., metro area for 20 years where she worked as a government contract manager. She left D.C. looking for the “opposite” type of community in which to raise her children and found it in Fairfield. She hopes to provide a perspective that other people can identify with.

• Joseph Tusoy is a software developer, and plans to write about anything related to technology. He has lived in Fairfield four years, and studied at Maharishi International University. He hopes to write about the area’s parks, family-friendly activities and the arts.

• Jordan Whitney, a Fairfield High School alumnus, is interested in writing about restaurants and bars, an industry he worked in when he lived in Chicago as well as here in Fairfield where he works at SOMM Wines. He’s also keen on writing about the “New Chicago” neighborhood near the railroad tracks at North Fourth Street where his family business, Whitney Monument Works, is located. He said the area was a vibrant business district years ago, and it’s now undergoing a revival that he’s excited to write about.