End of Year Update
Greetings! I'm not exactly sure where the months have gone, but I know they have been packed with activity.
Downtown St. Joseph wrapped another bustling holiday season, brought to you by countless hours of work from volunteers hanging lights & planning events, workers staffing businesses, guiding tours, decorating windows, and many others promoting all of the fun things that happened during the last months of 2022!
If you want to see a community in action, dedicated to bringing fun and new opportunities to our local citizens, look no further than the dedicated individuals in Downtown St. Joseph.
Thanks to each and every organization, business, individual volunteer, out-of-town visitor, and patron/shopper who came together to make Downtown a magical place filled with energy and fun this season.
MAIN STREET SAINT JOSEPH UPDATE
Community Data Collection
This fall, our Board adopted of the use of Maestro Community Manager software, and began a full implementation plan. The Maestro product--combined with a solid plan for data stewardship & maintenance--will allow us to gather, track and report community data for all of Downtown St. Joseph in a ways our community has never before seen.
The community data set that we have been working to collect since Spring 2021 include addresses, parcel numbers, owners, building year & architect(s), square footage, parking, occupancy, rental rates, and businesses that reside within. And for each business, we are also capturing owner info, rental rates, square footage, employee FTE data, business hours, years in business, former locations, and more. Collecting this much data for an entire district has been a huge undertaking, and with our new Maestro product being implemented, it finally gives us a safe and organized, place to monitor, update--and run organized reports!--for both short- and long-term community visioning.
Maestro will also allows us a centralized location to track volunteer hours, action plans, and so much more! We currently have a small group meeting regularly to input all of the community data we've been collecting since Spring 2021; The same group will also create a training plan for Board members --and eventually Downtown volunteers!--who will eventually be able track their time and project tasks in Maestro.
Data collection and stewardship for our district is such an an exciting project that will take many more weeks to be fully set up, but will eventually yield countless valuable reports for our district in 2023 and beyond. We can't wait to share the findings with you all as our data picture becomes clearer each season.
Task Forces
Earlier this year, we set our eyes on creating measurable goals for 2023. The community feedback received from the summer Town Hall + Brainstorm session gave us a lot to analyze the next few months, and led to a much clearer picture of how our local citizens define success in Downtown revitalization.
This is the Vision--shaped this fall, informed by community feedback--that takes us into 2023:
"Downtown Saint Joseph is a vibrant and welcoming neighborhood, bustling with diverse businesses and residents and alive with creative energy."
In order to shape next steps and create action plans that support this Vision, we are assembling two community task forces: Business & Residential Growth Task Force and the Cultural Identity Task Force. (See attached images on what each of these groups will be focused on in 2023.)
You'll note the "measurable outcomes" portion of each graphic below, which will be the focus of the two respective task forces as they brainstorm plans, grow their teams, and create movement toward concrete goals.
These task forces--which we are forming now and will begin meeting in January/February 2023--will include local experts in business recruitment/retention, architecture, arts, and real estate, and marketing, as well as leaders and representatives from Downtown organizations, City staff, successful Downtown business/property owners, artists and organizers. (If one of the above qualifications describes you and you'd like to be involved in one of the Task Forces, please do reach out please reach out to share your interest!)
It's been a busy 2022 year, with lots of work accomplished... and lots more to do in 2023. Thanks for your continued support of Downtown St. Joseph and of Main Street Saint Joseph.
Dana Massin
President, Main Street Saint Joseph
& Downtown Business Owner
________________
BUSINESS & RESIDENTIAL GROWTH TASK FORCE
Comments
Post a Comment