Main Street

Main Street is part of a national program that encourages communities to take steps to enact long term change, while also implementing short term, inexpensive and placed-based activities that attract people to the commercial center of the city. Main Street Managers partner with municipal authorities, various committees, local business owners, and volunteers to create a sense of enthusiasm and momentum for their cities. Throughout the country, both small-city downtowns and urban neighborhoods, Main Street is focused on renewing their community centers with proven methodology.

Historical Preservation and Promotion

position the downtown or commercial district as the center of the community and the hub of economic activity, while creating a positive image that showcases a community’s unique characteristics. This can be done through highlighting cultural traditions, celebrating and preserving important architecture and history, encouraging local businesses to market cooperatively, offering coordinated specials and sales, and hosting special events aimed at changing perceptions of the district and communicating to residents, investors, businesses, and property owners that this place is special.

Small Business Support and Economic Development

Revitalizing downtown Jefferson will focus on the city's economic vitality. This work is rooted in a commitment to making the most of a community’s unique characteristics and historic assets, and harnessing local economic development opportunities by creating an environment that supports small business while building a thriving commercial district for future entrepreneurs, innovators, and localists alike. Additionally, with the nation-wide growing interest in living downtown, supporting downtown housing is also a key element of building economic vitality.

Community and Design

A focus on design will support Jefferson's transformation by enhancing the physical elements of downtown, while capitalizing on the unique assets that set our commercial district apart. Main Street's attention to public spaces will work to enhance downtown's appeal to residents and visitors alike. This is done through the creation of pedestrian friendly streets, inclusion of public art in unexpected areas, visual merchandising, adaptive reuse of older and historic buildings, more efficiently-designed buildings, transit oriented development, and much more.