I've served on the New Baltimore Arts & Culture Commission for three years now, and this year I'm serving as treasurer for the first time.

I want to write about why, because I think it connects to something most small business owners get wrong about their own communities.

What the Commission Does

Arts and culture programming in a small city is not decoration. It's a meaningful part of what makes downtown worth walking through, what brings people to the Farmers Market on a Sunday, and what turns a place people drive past into a place people stop.

The commission works on that. Family activities, community events, programming that gives people a reason to be downtown rather than at a mall twenty minutes away.

None of it happens on its own. Someone has to plan it, fund it, and follow through, usually without much recognition.

Treasurer, First Year

Taking the treasurer role this year has been an education.

Running a small business means I already spend time with numbers, but municipal and commission finances are their own thing. Budgets are tight, every allocation is public, and the accountability runs to residents rather than to a P&L.

It's a useful discipline. When you're spending money that belongs to a community, the question shifts from “what's the return” to “what does this actually do for people who live here.” I've found that a healthier frame than I expected, and it's changed how I think about a few things on my own business side.

Why a Business Owner Should Care

Here's the part I want to make an argument for.

A lot of local business owners treat their community as a market — a supply of customers to reach through advertising. That's not wrong, but it's incomplete, and it's a thin way to operate.

The alternative is participation. Serving on a commission, joining a chamber, showing up to the events, doing the unglamorous volunteer work that keeps a downtown functioning. It's slower and there's no attribution model for it.

What it does produce is a genuine understanding of the place you're selling into, and relationships with people who aren't prospects. Both turn out to matter, and neither is available for purchase.

Three Years In

The thing I didn't expect is how much I'd learn about my own city.

I know how things get funded here. I know which events take real effort and which run themselves. I know a lot of people I wouldn't otherwise have met, and I understand what New Baltimore is trying to become rather than just what it currently is.

That's not a marketing credential. But when I work with businesses in this area — and most of my clients are within thirty minutes of here — it means I'm not guessing about the community they operate in.

If You're Considering It

Most communities have more open volunteer positions than volunteers. Commissions, boards, committees, chamber roles. The barrier is usually lower than people assume.

The ask is real: meetings, preparation, and follow-through. But if you run a business in a place and you've never contributed anything to that place beyond a storefront, this is a way to change that.

Three years in and I'd do it again.

I'm Jon Petrous. I run Jpetrous Creative Services out of Casco — branding, websites, and marketing for local businesses across Macomb and St. Clair County. If you're building something around here, get in touch.