Everything Your Main Street Organization Does Is Economic Development
After nearly 30 years in and around the Main Street movement, here is why an independent Main Street organization is one of the best economic-development investments a city can make.
By Charles Harris Rudd
I have been fortunate in my career to have worked for or with half a dozen different Main Street programs all around the state. When I say "Main Street program," I mean that the community adopted the National Trust for Historic Preservation's "Main Street 4-Point Approach" and so it has an organization dedicated to the revitalization of the downtown.
Most recently, I facilitated the startup of the Crescent City Downtown Partnership in Crescent City, Florida, as well as facilitating the restart of the Tarpon Springs Main Street program, now known as the Tarpon Springs Downtown District. I believe wholeheartedly in the approach and am always happy to facilitate its implementation. First as an Economic Development Director and redevelopment professional, and more recently as a City Manager, I am fortunate when I work in a community with a Main Street program. In the communities I have served, the organization has an awesome, very dedicated group of volunteers who serve as board members, committee members, and event staff. They are doing a great job keeping their downtowns in the forefront of the community's mind, working with the downtown merchants, bringing customers into the businesses, and providing a way for local folks to get involved. They are fantastic partners in the city's efforts to redevelop and grow the downtown, and they bring some very important elements to the table that sometimes get overlooked.
A proven methodology, not another group at the table
I have been involved in redevelopment for nearly 30 years. I started out as a Main Street Program Manager (a position now called Executive Director) and have been in and around the Main Street movement ever since, both as a Manager/Executive Director and a board member. I am certified as a Downtown Manager by the National Main Street Center of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
The "Main Street 4-Point Approach" is a methodology for organizing your redevelopment efforts in your community. The four points are Economic Vitality, Promotion, Design, and Organization. As the name states, it is an approach that the community adopts to organize its activities into a comprehensive, incremental effort to revitalize its downtown or commercial district. Part of the approach is to have a 501(c)(3) organization dedicated solely to the downtown revitalization effort. This means that, for optimal results, the organization is not embedded in the city government, chamber of commerce, or the merchants' association. It is independent, and its sole reason for being is the success of the downtown. The organization itself is an aspect of the approach, and the approach is what the organization uses to organize its efforts and create its work plan. It is not another group squeezing into the community to get a piece of the pie. It is the community, organized for revitalization.
There are other approaches, but I believe that utilizing the Main Street Approach yields the best results. Even when I have managed Community Redevelopment Agencies (CRA), I always organize my work plan around the 4-Point Approach. I am also a certified CRA Administrator, through the Florida Redevelopment Association, and the approach of CRAs is very similar to Main Street but without the "Organization" point.
"Organization" is the warm-fuzzy point that does the real engagement
"Organization" is bringing all the stakeholders to the table — the board is comprised not only of directors but also liaisons to organizations with a stake in the downtown — as well as cultivating a membership and recruiting, training, and utilizing volunteers. This is what I call the "warm fuzzy" point that is all about grass-roots community engagement.
If residents want to participate with the CRA, typically they get three minutes at the microphone under "public comment" on the agenda. This is unless there is a CRA advisory board made up of property owners in the redevelopment area who can serve, usually, three to six years. If these seats are full, or you don't own property in the redevelopment area, you are out of luck. Main Street organizations, by contrast, are comprised of volunteers — engaged residents and business owners who want to contribute and make a difference in their community.
The best scenario is to have a Main Street organization to engage citizens, champion and promote the downtown, increase foot traffic, increase and promote public art, encourage historic preservation, and work with the business owners — and to have a CRA to do the heavy lifting ($$$) of infrastructure, grants, land assembly, development agreements, and to cover the overhead of the Main Street organization. Whether there is a CRA or not, it is a team effort with the city. The Main Street organization is a critical partner in redevelopment.
I was a CRA Manager in a community that had no Main Street organization and a city government that had a really bad history and relationship with its downtown merchants. Whenever I walked in the door of a local business, I brought all that history with me, even though I was new to the city. I would have gladly dedicated $60,000 of my budget each year to contract with a Main Street organization to act as an ombudsman and work with the downtown merchants, put on special events and merchant events, increase our public input and participation, and more. Everything Main Street organizations do is economic development. Everything they do is important to, and part of, the city's economic development efforts.
The drift from "Our" Main Street to "those folks at Main Street"
I have always envied communities with brand-new Main Street organizations. These folks have so much enthusiasm and show such support for the organization and the approach. The program is always referred to as "Our" Main Street, and the folks involved — and community leaders — really seem to get it. They have often been working on reviving their downtown for some time, and now they have a proven methodology that, over time, will make the difference in their efforts and in their community. They start new events and initiatives based around the 4-Point Approach. Sometimes they take over ongoing events and activities that are in line with the approach. Generally, there is lots of enthusiasm and lots of support of time, talent, and treasure from the community.
As time goes by, however, "Our" Main Street organization becomes "The" Main Street organization and, eventually, even "those folks at Main Street." An "us" and "them" mentality slips in somewhere along the way. It is not uncommon to hear, "What do 'they' want now?" or "'They' probably want 'us' to waive our fees or provide in-kind services!"
Charging a Main Street organization permit fees, or charging for services, is like charging your facilities-maintenance folks a fee to rent the vacuum they use to clean the carpet in your council chambers that you hired them to clean — and having them stop cleaning to conduct an event to raise the money to pay the rental fee! It makes no sense for the city to contract with the Main Street program to utilize the Main Street approach — an approach that calls for special events — and then turn around and charge the Main Street program to put on special events. It would be like contracting with a consultant to create a master plan or conduct a study that includes public meetings, and then charging them rent for the city building in which the meeting is held.
As a team, the Main Street folks will organize and staff the events, recruit and coordinate the vendors and entertainment, solicit sponsors, and round up and manage volunteers, while the city provides the venue, support staff, materials, and the like. Together, everything gets covered. And if the Main Street organization can make a profit on the event, this enables it to do even more work — for "us!" It is a great way to leverage CRA and city dollars to get the events we need for a comprehensive redevelopment strategy, and to have those dollars go further with the ripple effect of teaming up with our Main Street organization.
I think every Main Street conference that I have attended, or at which I have spoken, has a session to train Main Street professionals in how to find out what the city and CRA are planning and how to come alongside them and contribute to move the ball forward. I think it may be time for city conferences to have sessions training city officials in how to empower, enable, and partner with their Main Street folks.
This piece is part of a larger field guide on downtown redevelopment for Florida communities.