Friday, May 16, 2008
Arts could fuel downtown Blacksburg, says visiting mayor
Lessons from North Adams, Mass., also could help Pulaski find a focus for redefining its future.
Capitalize on what you have in your community and embrace the Virginia Tech arts initiative coming to your downtown, John Barrett, mayor of North Adams, Mass., told Blacksburg and other local officials this afternoon.
Barrett gave a nearly two–hour presentation at Blacksburg town hall on how his city bounced back from oblivion when a contemporary arts museum opened in North Adams’ downtown 20 years ago.
Momentum inside and outside Blacksburg government has been growing around the concept of revitalizing the town’s core through arts and culture initiatives, including an experimental theater building currently under construction along College Avenue. The theater is being built by Virginia Tech.
But bigger changes are coming, and Barrett encouraged about 40 attendees to not just embrace them, but to capitalize on them.
Of the $82 million Center for the Arts at Virginia Tech planned for construction at North Main and Turner streets on the current site of Shultz Hall, Barrett said: “This will forever change the face of Blacksburg.”
The center is going to bring restaurants, housing and a different kind of traffic to the downtown and “will change the image of the community,” Barrett said.
In the 1980s, the manufacturing base of North Adams collapsed and the town slipped into blight. Unemployment rose to 14 percent. Seventy percent of storefronts were vacant, Barrett said.
But North Adams fought for and eventually won a $35 million grant to convert an old manufacturing site into the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art. It was a somewhat bizarre addition to this profoundly rural, deeply blue collar northeastern town, Barrett said.
But officials sold it to the legislature and the city’s residents as an economic development engine. Today the city is a premiere arts and business hub with new Internet companies, arts studios and restaurants.
Then city government began offering tax incentives and loan programs to encourage businesses to move to the town. Many of them chose to refurbish blighted residential and commercial areas of the city, Barrett said.
North Adams didn’t even get touch tone phone lines until the 1990s, the mayor said. But Blacksburg already has most of the necessary infrastructure in place to capitalize on the arts.
Government officials from other localities also attended the talk, including Pulaski County Assistant County Administrator Robert Hiss.
Pulaski County and the town of Pulaski are currently working on an economic redevelopment plan for the area, which has also seen the collapse of its manufacturing base, most recently with the closure of Pulaski Furniture.
“We’re trying to redefine ourselves,” Hiss said.
Hiss said he took away two things from Barrett’s talk. One, officials need to discuss the place of arts and culture in Pulaski County’s economic future.
Second, and perhaps most importantly, “we need to find a focus,” he said.
Barrett’s talk was sponsored by the town of Blacksburg, the Blacksburg Partnership and the Virginia Tech Arts Initiative.
Barrett gave a nearly two–hour presentation at Blacksburg town hall on how his city bounced back from oblivion when a contemporary arts museum opened in North Adams’ downtown 20 years ago.
Momentum inside and outside Blacksburg government has been growing around the concept of revitalizing the town’s core through arts and culture initiatives, including an experimental theater building currently under construction along College Avenue. The theater is being built by Virginia Tech.
But bigger changes are coming, and Barrett encouraged about 40 attendees to not just embrace them, but to capitalize on them.
Of the $82 million Center for the Arts at Virginia Tech planned for construction at North Main and Turner streets on the current site of Shultz Hall, Barrett said: “This will forever change the face of Blacksburg.”
The center is going to bring restaurants, housing and a different kind of traffic to the downtown and “will change the image of the community,” Barrett said.
In the 1980s, the manufacturing base of North Adams collapsed and the town slipped into blight. Unemployment rose to 14 percent. Seventy percent of storefronts were vacant, Barrett said.
But North Adams fought for and eventually won a $35 million grant to convert an old manufacturing site into the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art. It was a somewhat bizarre addition to this profoundly rural, deeply blue collar northeastern town, Barrett said.
But officials sold it to the legislature and the city’s residents as an economic development engine. Today the city is a premiere arts and business hub with new Internet companies, arts studios and restaurants.
Then city government began offering tax incentives and loan programs to encourage businesses to move to the town. Many of them chose to refurbish blighted residential and commercial areas of the city, Barrett said.
North Adams didn’t even get touch tone phone lines until the 1990s, the mayor said. But Blacksburg already has most of the necessary infrastructure in place to capitalize on the arts.
Government officials from other localities also attended the talk, including Pulaski County Assistant County Administrator Robert Hiss.
Pulaski County and the town of Pulaski are currently working on an economic redevelopment plan for the area, which has also seen the collapse of its manufacturing base, most recently with the closure of Pulaski Furniture.
“We’re trying to redefine ourselves,” Hiss said.
Hiss said he took away two things from Barrett’s talk. One, officials need to discuss the place of arts and culture in Pulaski County’s economic future.
Second, and perhaps most importantly, “we need to find a focus,” he said.
Barrett’s talk was sponsored by the town of Blacksburg, the Blacksburg Partnership and the Virginia Tech Arts Initiative.
