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The Spring Street Journal
April 2, 2003 News Story

Citizens Present Main Street Program to Community

Ned Lawler.

ST. MARYS -- Thirty community leaders representing business owners, city departments, local education and other interested people met at the Community Public Library Tuesday, April 1, to hear a presentation on the Main Street USA downtown revitalization program.

The presentation brought to the public the result of many months of preparation by a relatively small but dedicated local group consisting of Ned Lawler, David Rosenbeck, Scott Rosenbeck, Delilah Klosterman, Madonna Pettit and others. They hope to focus on the strong features of St. Marys' downtown business district in order to revitalize the area in terms of architectural appearance and integrity while attracting more businesses and shoppers. Recognizing the fact that this will require a long-term commitment by many people, they began by investigating successful revitalization plans undertaken by other communities.

This investigation led them to the Main Street USA program, which many "showcase" communities follow in their preservation and revitalization efforts. The Main Street program was started in 1977 by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. In Ohio, the program is overseen by Heritage Ohio & Downtown Ohio Inc.

In October, 2002 the group hosted a Downtown Assessment Resource Team (DART) visit from Downtown Ohio, Inc. Funding for the visit was raised locally. The purpose of the 2-day visit was to analyze the possibility of St. Marys being selected to become an official state Main Street program. The selection process is competitive among petitioning cities across the state and only a limited number of cities are selected. Communities selected receive three years of free technical assistance, training, manuals, inspections and contacts for their program. The 13 officially recognized Ohio Main Street Communities are Bowling Green, Delaware, Galion, Gallipolis, Lorain, Lima, Mansfield, New Philadelphia, New Richmond, Norwalk, Oberlin, Piqua and Wellington. There are 1668 Main Street programs nationwide.

Comments made by the DART team during the visit and their subsequent report encouraged the local group to continue their efforts. The report is available to be read at the Library.

At the meeting, Ned Lawler served as host and, after some background commentary on the purpose of the meeting, introduced speaker John Bry. Bry is a professional urban planner specializing in downtown revitalization projects, and has led several long-term community projects in three states. He is currently the full-time administrator of the City of Urbana's revitalization project.
John Bry.

Bry listed four points used by the "Main Street Approach:" Organization, Design, Promotion and Economic Restructuring. He said design standards, for instance, can be strict or almost non-existant and are entirely set by each participating community. Likewise, individual business participation in the program is voluntary.

In a slide presentation, Bry illustrated his talk with before-and-after pictures of communities he has worked in such as Flora, Illinois; Columbus and Auburn, Indiana and Urbana, Ohio.

A general Q & A session followed Bry's presentation.

City of St. Marys Industrial and Community Development Manager Todd Fleagle cited city efforts such as Memorial Park projects, Spring Street street-scaping, the South Street river bridge and the new bridge planned for High Street, but acknowledged that we can't keep our head in the sand and continue to move forward. Business owner Larry Kramer remembered the generally successful downtown renovation project in the 1970s, but noted that it should have been continued to remain effective. He stressed that the St. Marys downtown could benefit from more and better-coordinated promotion of its assets.

"Unofficial City Historian" George Neargarder commented on how much things have changed over his 60 years of retail experience in St. Marys. He suggested a free handout for State Park campers and gas station customers mapping locations of St. Marys businesses.

St. Marys Area Chamber of Commerce Director Nick Van Schoyck was concerned that existing small-margin businesses could be squeezed out by higher rents brought about by increased future property values if the program performed as it should. "How many downtown shops from the start of the Main Street program are still there at the end? We don't want to improve things [for new stores] at the expense of current businesses." Bry answered that yes, property values did usually increase as a result of the program, but small businesses fail for many reasons, not the least of which is lack of viable business plans. The increased vitality of the district can be expected to benefit those businesses which serve a need in the market.

Delilah Klosterman was pleased to see so many aspects of the St. Marys community represented at the meeting. She added the thought that if this project could help renovate the second and third floors of many of the downtown buildings, that additional square-footage could be leased or sublet to lower-margin concerns. Madonna Pettit said renovation and preservation grant money is possible for any individual buildings or districts listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Application to the National Register could be part of a local Main Street program.

Van Schoyck said that the city should be requested to form a committee to ensure that all voices are heard - many aspects of many different projects need to be fit together and incorporated.

The tenor of the Q & A session was one of cautious cooperation. Any program affecting, and requiring the participation of, so many influential, long-standing, and occasionally competing concerns has its work cut out for it. Bry's presentation demonstrated that it can be done, given enough civic will and determination. Tuesday's meeting may prove to be a start.

Chris Botkin

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