Little Falls now has a modern way to spread the word about local events, thanks to a new LED communications sign installed on the east side of City Hall – a project driven by the Little Falls Rotary Club and made possible with help from a Main Street tech business.
The idea took root more than a year ago, according to Allen Kazmerski, President of the Little Falls Rotary Club. Members had noticed other communities using digital signage, and the club got a firsthand look at what was possible when it saw the LED sign already in use at the Episcopal Church.
“We thought it would be a good thing to bring about a gift, a communications site for the city,” Kazmerski said, explaining the sign fit naturally with Rotary’s motto: Service Above Self.
“Rotary is about people who love their community, want to help their community, and come together to make things happen,” he said, whether through service projects like the sign, scholarships, fundraising, or simply building friendships along the way.
A Team Effort
Kazmerski credited former Rotary President Rick Morgan with getting the project off the ground during his term, spending countless hours working with the sign’s manufacturer and the Episcopal Church to gather information before a Rotary LED committee of five or six members took over the physical installation.
Local business owner Bob Pohlig also stepped up, donating paint and advice for removing rust from the sign structure.
“That’s what our community is all about – businesses helping other organizations,” Kazmerski said.
But it was Trusted Technologies, the Main Street IT firm, that Kazmerski singled out as essential to getting the sign fully operational.
“We wouldn’t have it up and running without Trusted Technologies,” he said. “They gave us a laptop, but not only that, they gave us the knowledge on how to use the software and actually get it running.”
Kazmerski said he was especially impressed with Kevin Ciulla, who spent two hours training three Rotary members on how to operate the sign after walking them through its dashboard. “That reflects on the community that we’re living in and the goodness of these people on Main Street,” he said.
Behind the Scenes with Trusted Technologies
Ciulla, owner of Trusted Technologies, said his involvement started when a friend mentioned a piece of aging hardware that needed restoring for the sign project. When he saw it was still running Windows 7, he offered something better instead – hardware his company would otherwise have recycled.
As it turned out, the donated equipment wasn’t needed. The sign itself came with a modern, internet-based interface that could be programmed from any laptop. The real work, Ciulla found, was setting it up from scratch.
“When I got there, I realized it wasn’t as programmed as I expected it to be – it was set up sort of at the base level,” he said. His team connected the sign to local internet service and built out a secure account structure for the volunteers who would be managing it.
As a cybersecurity professional, Ciulla made sure the setup included modern safeguards. “Since I’m a cybersecurity guy, I got to force a couple of security standards, like two-factor authentication,” he said. “I try to do it the right way.”
Training the Rotary volunteers, he said, mattered just as much as the technical setup. Ciulla spent a couple of hours demonstrating how to build and schedule signboards, and even walked the group through creating rotating sign sequences – a feature that will come in handy for planning around major community events like the Cheese Festival.
“We can show somebody how to set up a bunch of different boards that rotate and then prepare them for a big event for Little Falls,” he said, noting that boards can be built out months in advance as sponsors and details come together.
The sign can now be managed through its web interface or a companion mobile app.
A Reflection of Main Street
For Ciulla, the project is part of a bigger story about investing in the city where he chose to open his business.
“I’ve donated a lot of my education, my experience into this city, and I love it and enjoy it,” he said. Despite running an IT company that could easily operate remotely, Ciulla opened Trusted Technologies right on Main Street.
“It’s been inspirational” watching other businesses open nearby, he said. “I’m really happy to be part of it.”
With the sign now fully operational, the Little Falls Rotary Club has a new tool to keep residents informed – and a fresh example, organizers say, of what’s possible when local groups and businesses work together.
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Not too ideal a location for being able to read it from a moving vehicle. Should have put it on the corner of William & Main and move the mailbox that doesn’t have vehicle access like the one in front of post office.
They need to have two of these on the opposite sides of the city on Route 5 for when people are zipping by to actually entice them to go into Little Falls.
One by the current, “take a left to 167, Albany street” sign that sends people past McDonalds and one by the traffic light coming from Dolgeville that if people take a right it takes them into the city past St. Marys and Benton Hall.