Group talks revitalizing downtown

ST. MARYS - A committee seeking to revitalize downtown St. Marys, encourage people to support their local businesses and possibly teach prospective
business owners what hurdles they should expect is forming after a Monday town hall meeting.

More than 40 people attended the open forum organized by resident John Burd and held in the basement of the St. Marys Eagles Aerie. Burd said he was tired of people just talking and wanted something to be done about the empty downtown buildings.

"As most people know, we have some problems with the downtown business district, and I wanted to get some people together and get some ideas of what we can do," he said at the opening of the meeting.

The goal was to discuss the needs of the community, develop a brand for the city that could be used for marketing purposes and to allow those interested to sign up for the future committee, which currently has no name. The next meeting, which will be announced later, likely will be more focused on organizing the committee itself.

People jumped in to discuss what they felt were the community's strong points and its challenges. Several suggested a branding branch of the future committee try to capitalize on the parks and green space St. Marys has to offer, with one woman saying she believed the parks were underutilized as a meeting place and could be used for more festivals or events such as movies in the park.

Others said people needed to reach out to the younger generation to see what its members wanted in the area. Two young men in their 20s offered some answers. One said he tried to support the local businesses and liked the idea of revitalizing the movie theater, but if attracting young people were a concern, city leaders needed to focus on bringing affordable housing to the area. The other echoed the desire for housing, saying it was unreasonable to ask young people to live in the area when it offered nothing for them to do and housing prices keep rising.

Looking at the revitalization of other downtown areas could help, others said. Investigating how Bellefontaine refurbished its downtown area could provide ideas, one man said.

Other attendees said a bigger part of the issue wasn't just getting stores into the buildings but getting residents to support them. Tracy Miley, co-owner of Effie's Boutique, said many customers were actually from the surrounding communities rather than St. Marys. Changing the mentality of St. Marys residents and encouraging them to support locally owned businesses would need to be another committee focus.

Another possible area of focus would be educating prospective local business owners on the hurdles they'd face, similar to the role filled by Business Enterprise Center at Wright State University-Lake Campus.

Several city council members attended, and president Jim Harris cautioned those signing up for the committee to brace themselves for slow change. He said he was on city council when Chief Supermarkets decided to leave St. Marys and noted it took years for the economic developer to replace it.

"Don't expect miracles overnight. You can expect miracles but don't expect them overnight," he said.