Wednesday, Sep. 01, 2010

Another piece of advice for Garner

Recently, some experts in downtown revitalization gave Garner three pieces of advice: Maintain downtown's historic roots while fostering new growth, assure potential businesses that local government is willing to spend money downtown and create a place people will want to visit.

The first piece of advice is a no-brainer. Folks like history, including historic downtowns, and until the recession hit, developers everywhere were turning old warehouse and factories into shops and housing.

The second piece of advice is sound too but needs a qualifier. We think government should treat downtown like any other business district: providing and maintaining such infrastructure as streets and water and sewer lines. Downtown should get no less, but we don't know that it should get more.

The third piece of advice is harder to buy because it seems born out of some myth or revisionist history about Main Street America. Downtown Garner was once a destination for diners and shoppers, but not because of anything the town did. It's just that businesses years ago found safety in numbers, much like today's shopping centers and malls. Why do some people now think that downtown Garner needs a taxpayer-financed community center or other public building to become a destination again?

At the very least, Garner leaders ought to be honest in selling a community center or town hall to taxpayers. Smithfield, for example, says that its recreation and aquatics center is close to breaking even. But in measuring revenue against expenses, the town never includes the debt payments on the building, which cost millions. What family can exclude its mortgage payment from its household budget?

The answer is that none can, and neither should a town that wants to measure when a public investment in downtown might pay for itself in revenue from sales and property taxes.

That's just some food for thought for Garner leaders as they debate how to breathe new life into downtown.