Main Street conference draws many planners

By TOM KANE

LIBERTY, NY — Main Street revitalization projects are flourishing in New York State, if attendance at a conference is any indication. Over 70 planners and economic developers attended the eight annual Main Street Forum on November 7.

“Some people drove four hours from upstate to get here,” said Robert Dadras, one of the organizers of the all-day conference.

A panel of county planners from Ulster, Sullivan, Delaware and Albany counties exchanged ideas and related some of their Main Street successes. An expert planner from a public planning and design company that specializes in Main Street revitalization projects went step-by-step through every stage of a major project that has transformed Rouche’s Point, a community at the northern end of Lake Champlain.

Edward Sheeran, a retired vice president of Chase Manhattan Bank, a special assistant to the mayor of Yonkers and the IDA executive director, presented an overview of recent outstanding projects and accomplishments. In Yonkers, a series of waning, old neighborhoods of brownfields—vacant lots that were once industrial or commercial sites—has been transformed into a chain of thriving neighborhoods showing signs of vitality.

One of the social and economic trends in recent years has been the migration of people out of the cities and towns of the country into the suburbs and outlying areas, which have turned the cities and towns into depressed areas.

“This conference is attempting to get people to re-examine this trend and reverse it,” Dadras said.

“Upstate New York has as an amazing opportunity to create a new era for a new downtown movement,” said Irwin Davis, executive director of the Downtown Committee of Syracuse and the president of the New York State Urban Council, who was the keynote speaker.

“Our downtowns are becoming cultural and art centers where economic development is beginning to reverse years of neglect,” Davis said. “The term ‘economic development’ used to mean bricks and mortar. Now it’s beginning to mean people and talent.”

Speaker after speaker related stories of successful attempts to turn depressed neighborhoods into small successes of development, both commercial and residential.

And then, as if to reach out to the other extreme and strengthen the local community, the conference explored the need to promote regionalism. In this context, some speakers mentioned that “home rule” is seen as an obstacle to regionalism that is needed to revive depressed cities and towns.

“I would say it is more of a challenge than an obstacle,” said Helen Budrock of the Catskill Center of Conservation and Development. “There are plenty of examples of how communities are working together regionally despite home rule.”

“I don’t think home rule has to be a problem,” said Alan Sorensen of Planit Main Street, Inc. “Communities can draw more resources and overcome any obstacle if they work together. Look at the Scenic Byway program. This is an example of how towns are working together regionally.”