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Retaining McGregor seen as economic key to town
Distilling the thoughts of 13 people who care so much
about Yellow Springs that they can’t stop talking long enough to
make a decision is a hard job.
But Sandra Kennedy of Wright State University’s
Center for Urban and Public Affairs was able to keep the economic discussion
group, a breakout group from last Saturday’s visioning conference,
focused so they could devise several goals to address challenges facing
the local economy.
To stabilize the economic base, participants first
agreed that Yellow Springs needs to keep Antioch University McGregor in
town. They then said that new and existing businesses could be supported
by providing more local hospitality options, business space and employee
skills training.
Participating in the economic group were Dan Young
(owner of Young’s Jersey Dairy), Mary Kay Smith (Winds Cafe), Carol
Gasho (Community Resources and Antioch Company), Susan Stiles (Greene Metropolitain
Housing Authority), Village Planning Commission chairman Bruce Rickenbach,
Historical Society president David Neuhardt, Tim Rogers (Town Drug), Ted
Jackson (Central Chapel AME Church), Eric Johnson (Yellow Springs Endowment
for Education), school board member Richard Lapedes, Village Council president
Tony Arnett, Antioch University McGregor President Barbara Gellman-Danley
and Fred Bartenstein (community-at-large).
Initially, the discussion group focused on the challenges
facing the economy. Participants identified 25 issues — from the closure
of Vernay Laboratories’ plants and the instability of Antioch College
to the lack of hotel space and Yellow Springs’ anti-business image
— that needed improvement.
Using a voting process of elimination, the group
prioritized as goals keeping McGregor here, retaining and supporting existing
and small businesses, and defining commercial niches that Yellow Springs
might exploit. The group then fashioned action plans to address those priorities.
As for McGregor’s challenges, Barbara Gellman-Danley
spelled out the immediate needs. McGregor is not only growing its undergraduate
degree and weekend college programs, but the school plans to develop an
educational institute with national reach, she said.
The new program would serve the interests of adults
in need of intellectual stimulation, she said. School leaders also want
to design a new interpretive center. The project would require more hotels,
extended stay lodging, restaurants and other hospitality services, Gellman-Danley
said.
“You probably wouldn’t recognize it as
an educational institution,” she said. “We want to create a
revitalization and communicate that out across the country....We’re
not thinking small anymore, and it takes a village to make it happen.”
The Village and Township governments and Community
Resources have been working to secure land for what Lapedes suggested be
called a commerce campus.
But Arnett said that local support services do not
serve the needs of visitors to the Glen, John Bryan State Park and the bikepath.
The area on the south side of town, around Kahoe Lane, would accommodate
some of these services, he said. And Yellow Springs could also afford some
residential and business development closer to the downtown area, Arnett
said.
The group also suggested providing local employee
training services to teach young people business and life skills employers
find valuable. The Village could establish an agency to direct people to
training centers in the Miami Valley, someone suggested.
The group proposed creating a business advisory
council to better support and improve communication between existing businesses.
A business Web site for sharing information might also be helpful, one participant
said.
The group spent significant time talking about the
fact that Yellow Springs, according to Greene County Development Coordinator
Phil Huston, is branded as unfriendly to business because of its high taxes,
expensive housing and small number of accommodations and services.
The village says it is an open, tolerant and diverse
community, yet Yellow Springs is more averse to change than any of its surrounding
communities, Gellman-Danley said.
Others agreed, saying that downtown is perceived
as unfriendly to outsiders, whom villagers call “tourists” rather
than “visitors” or “guests,” several participants
said.
Participants suggested hiring a public relations
consultant to change people’s perceptions of Yellow Springs. They
also expressed hope that the work they were doing to promote economic activity
would help change the community’s negative identity.
—Lauren Heaton |
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