Mon, Dec 01 2008
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Published August 19, 2008 02:14 pm - Main Street boss praises town’s ‘charm’ By Liz McMahan Times Editor The old buildings that make up Fort Gibson’s downtown are more than just a reflection of the town’s past, the director of the Oklahoma Main Street Center said here Thursday. Linda Barnett met with more than a dozen community leaders to discuss the Main Street program and what it could do if Fort Gibson were selected to participate. “You have a lot to work with,” Barnett said. “I would really hate to see Fort Gibson become a big town because it has such small-town charm.” Any town, anywhere can have the cookie-cutter modern-day architecture of the franchise chains, she said. “Downtown is what gives you your personality,” Barnett said. “Why would they (tourists) want to come see it if it’s just like everybody else?” The downtown buildings represent the heart of the community, and restoring that heart is one of the primary goals of the Main Street program, she said. Main Street is about helping the community fill the downtown buildings with businesses that will make a profit and generate sales tax revenue for the town, she said. She cited several program success stories, including Woodward, where there were 31 vacant buildings in the downtown area, and in less than two years as a Main Street community, the town had only five downtown vacancies. Fort Gibson has excellent housing, she said. “It shows people do care, and, of course, you’ve got the fort. “Our goal would be to look at your community and look at all those people going to the fort and think about what we could sell to those people,” Barnett said. Making Main Street work in Fort Gibson would take a lot of work from a part-time paid director and lots of volunteers and committed business owners, she said. “We don’t bring a brown paper bag of money and say, ‘Here, fix up your community,’ and I don’t think it would work if we did,” she said. “If people invest in it, they own it. We do help find money, but there’s not a lot of free lunches out there.” Main Street now has 43 participating communities, and two more are expected to be added this year, she said. However, there are some programs, like streetscape planning that Main Street can bring to Fort Gibson even without its participation in Main Street, Barnett said. 
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