MOSES LAKE — Downtown Moses Lake has had a pretty good year. 

“I think people are starting to recognize that there is stuff downtown,” said Downtown Moses Lake Association Executive Director Mallory Miller. 

Much of that realization has come through the DMLA’s events, Miller said. This year, the DMLA hosted six major community festivals, four of which were free for all comers. The other two, Brews & Tunes in March and Sip & Stroll in September, were fueled by ticket sales. Those events draw crowds not just to the businesses hosting the tastings, but to the ones around them, Miller said. 

The DMLA event calendar started in March with Brews & Tunes, which involved breweries, cideries and distilleries setting up tastings inside businesses with local musicians performing either inside or right outside the shops. 

Early spring weather is always chancy in Moses Lake, and the day of Brews & Tunes, rain and hail made the streets not a fun place to be. That actually worked to the event’s advantage, Miller said. 

“Normally it's like sunny gorgeous and people are outside mingling in the streets,” Miller said. “But because it was raining, it forced people inside for longer amounts of time. And so, businesses loved it because people were hanging out all day.” 

This year also introduced a new aspect to Brews & Tunes: online scams. The event usually sells out a couple of weeks ahead of the date, and people were posting that they had tickets to sell on social media. All those claims were false, Miller said. Because alcohol is involved, tickets to Brews & Tunes and Sip & Stroll aren’t transferable, and the DMLA keeps records of who buys them. 

“People were posting ‘I have four tickets for sale.’” Miller said. “And … the next day I would come into work, and I would look up that person's name and see that they didn't have tickets.” 

Nobody actually tried to redeem scalped tickets, she added. However, the DMLA took the unprecedented step of refunding some tickets because the weather prevented attendees from the west side from getting to Moses Lake. 

Social media took to the dark side for that event, but it’s also been a powerful tool in the DMLA’s toolbox, Miller said. DMLA Event Specialist Sarah Page, who started work in July, leveraged her knowledge of the online world to get the DMLA’s – and Moses Lake’s – image out into the wide world using Facebook Reels: short, quickly-made videos that the creator can add sound and effects to. 

“It's just an easy way to advertise in a mass way where if you pick something trending, it will go farther,” Page said. 

She made videos to advertise DMLA merch, and to document activities like the banner exchange, when she and Miller, with help from LocalTel and the Grant PUD, went through downtown replacing banners with wreaths and LED candles for the holiday season. 

“(It) exposes the work that we do behind the scenes that nobody sees, and (shows that) it's not just one person doing it,” Page said. “There is a whole bunch of people that we have to get together to make this happen, and we have to do it in a very short amount of time.” 

Volunteers also drove the DMLA’s Spring Cleanup in April, taking to the streets and alleys to pick up trash.  

“Because we had so many volunteers that day, we were done in two hours,” Miller said. 

Sip & Stroll in September was done a little differently this year, because the DMLA coordinated with several other organizations to hold events on the same day. Care Moses Lake’s Care Fair, Columbia Basin Allied Arts’ Art on Third joined the DMLA on a closed-off Third Avenue. Sip & Stroll was something like Brews & Tunes, except that it focused more on wine and was slower paced. 

“It’s more sedate and more mellow,” Page said. 

The DMLA kicked off the holiday season with the annual Downtown Tree Lighting in November, which drew business to the local merchants through scavenger hunts that took children – and their parents – from shop to shop. 

“(One owner) told us that she had a clicker for how many times people came into her door and it was 150 people for that two-hour event,” Miller said. “And she was like, I don't even think I got everybody.” 

The event calendar wrapped up with the Ag Appreciation Parade in December, with lit-up farm equipment, food and hot chocolate. 

The DMLA had its own milestone this year, moving from the Desert Plaza building at Third Avenue and Alder Street to its permanent home on Division Street. That move was complete in July, just as Page came on board and Miller prepared to go on maternity leave. Page got a crash course in managing the DMLA, she said, while Miller was out. 

The new office has space for both Miller and Page, as well as a community area for members of the DMLA to use as sort of an extended workspace, with printers, coffee pots, desks and chairs. There are also T-shirts, hoodies and other merch for sale promoting Moses Lake and its businesses. 

Next year, Miller said, the DMLA is planning to add an event in February: a Ladies Night Out.  

    Attendees check out wine at Sip & Stroll in September. Sip & Stroll is one of the Downtown Moses Lake Association’s signature events every year.
  

    A young picnic attendee gets her hair “dyed” with a temporary pink color at the Moses Lake Family Picnic in June.
  

    Moses Lake-themed shirts, hoodies and tote bags hang in the Downtown Moses Lake Associaiton’s office on South Division Street.