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MAIN STREET MILWAUKEE ADDS TWO
NEW DISTRICTS
April 28, 2008
Commercial Corridor Program
Demonstrating Success
Mayor Tom Barrett announced today the
Main Street Milwaukee program will
expand
this year due to its successes in
attracting new businesses, leveraging
private
investment and improving properties
along four of Milwaukee’s neighborhood
main
streets. Main Street Milwaukee, modeled
after a national program to revitalize
older
commercial streets, is a collaboration
between the City of Milwaukee and Local
Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC).
Since Main Street Milwaukee’s launch in
2005, a total of 597 neighborhood
businesses
received assistance ranging from
financial and economic development
resources to
grants for property improvements,
professional consultations and more.
Work by the
Main Street Districts has helped attract
or expand 68 businesses, netting more
than 160
new jobs. Fifty-seven buildings have
been updated under the program and an
additional
$4.4 million in private investment was
leveraged across the districts.
“I launched this program to boost small
businesses and attract more investment
to our
neighborhood main streets,” said Mayor
Barrett. “This program is succeeding
because it
focuses not only the funding but the
work of businesses and resident
volunteers to turn
around blight, promote a main street
identity and attract additional
neighborhood
businesses.”
Currently Milwaukee’s Main Street
Districts include: Silver City on ‘interNational’
Avenue
and Lincoln Village along Lincoln Ave on
the city’s south side; the SOHI (South
of
Highland) District on N. 27th Street and
Mosaic on Burleigh District on the north
side.
Over the past three years, work in these
districts has included planning and
executing
revitalization projects, marketing and
public safety initiatives.
Mayor Barrett said the addition of two
new Main Street Districts will help
promote an
even greater awareness of opportunities
in Milwaukee neighborhoods to locate a
business, or find services close to
home.
The Main Street Milwaukee Partners
Board, an oversight group of community
representatives, designated the
following new Main Street Milwaukee
Districts:
• The ‘Gateway’ District
along West North Avenue from
27th Street to Sherman
Boulevard. This commercial street serves
a number of local neighborhoods
including Metcalfe Park, Washington Park
and parts of Sherman Park. Several
new developments have come online over
the past few years in the Gateway
District, and classic buildings provide
an anchor for additional development.
The
North Avenue Community Development
Corporation is the partnering
organization.
• Historic King Drive District
along Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive
from Locust
to Walnut. The Main Street District
falls within the Historic King Drive
Business
Improvement District, a two-mile
commercial corridor from Locust south to
McKinley Street. MLK Economic
Development Corporation is the
partnering
organization. King Drive has retained
many of its historic buildings and most
of
the street has been designated a
historic district. Many historic gems
need a
facelift, which the Main Street
Milwaukee program will help boost.
"A new generation of local developers
with deep roots throughout the Gateway
District is
transforming the central city for the
better,” said Alderman Willie Hines Jr,
representing
the new Gateway Main Street Milwaukee
District. “From Scoopz to Toussaint
Square to
Legacy Bank, this commercial corridor
has generated intense interest from
other
businesses that are waiting in line to
be part of the North Avenue movement."
The Main
Street Milwaukee program uses public and
private dollars and a 4-point
approach to strengthen neighborhood main
streets. Much of the program’s success
depends on the hard work of neighborhood
residents and business owners. In 2007,
more than 200 volunteers logged more
than 15,000 volunteer hours on various
events
and projects among the four Main Street
Milwaukee Districts.
"Main Street
Milwaukee is one of the best things that
has happened in our
neighborhoods,” said Margaret Henningsen,
a member of the Main Street Milwaukee
Partners Board. “I feel strongly that
this program could serve as a model for
Urban Main
Street Programs across the country.”
For
more information on Main Street
Milwaukee, visit
www.mkedcd.org/mainstreetmilwaukee
Central city
inspires African nation development
Milwaukee Journal Sentinal
Posted: Aug. 28, 2007
Implausibly, Nigeria, a
nation rich in mineral assets
such as oil and diamonds, is
looking to Milwaukee's central
city as a model for economic
development.
 That's right. Milwaukee, with
the eighth-highest rate of
poverty among large cities in
America, has captured the
interest of Nigeria, a nation in
western Africa where devastating
poverty affects nearly 60% of
the population, despite vast
wealth in fossil fuels.
I found this a little hard to
comprehend, but that's the
problem with Milwaukee - it
often takes an outsider to see
opportunities that people here
miss.
And Nigerian officials see a
goldmine in a part of the city
that many businesses abandoned
years ago and still shun today.
They are impressed with the
revitalization along North Ave.,
a neighborhood that is making a
comeback.
The consul general of Nigeria,
Ibrahim Auwalu, came to
Milwaukee on Aug. 17 to meet
with city leaders. The purpose
was to discuss economic
opportunities between Nigeria
and central city businesses and
ways Nigeria could duplicate the
business reinvestment and
housing development that have
occurred along the North Ave.
corridor.
During his Milwaukee visit, one
of several this year, Auwalu
toured new retail and office space and
housing developments. The neighborhood
is bounded by I-43 to 48th St. on the
west, Burleigh St. on the north and
Juneau Ave. on the south.
Here you have a community that
was being abandoned, but through
the sheer determination of the
people to bring it back to life,
it's now being revived," Auwalu
said in a phone interview last
week. "It is that determination
that we're interested in."
Development model Auwalu, who represents the
president of Nigeria, learned
about redevelopment efforts in
Milwaukee's central city from
Ali Garba, a local Nigerian who
is a vice president and investment
officer for Wachovia Securities.
Garba met Auwalu at a conference
of Nigerian professionals last
year in Minneapolis and invited
him to visit Milwaukee to get a
firsthand view of the
development taking place in the
central city, pointing to North
Ave. as a model.
The Nigerian government is
interested in partnering with
the North Avenue Community
Development Corp., a non-profit
organization that is buying and
developing commercial and
residential real estate
properties along North Ave. The
goal would be to share ideas and
resources for economic
development both here and in
Nigeria, Auwalu said.
This delights Renee Booker,
president and chief executive
officer of the North Ave.
development group.
This is a
unique opportunity where
Milwaukee can really make a
national name. This is the kind
of thing you don't hear about,"
Booker said. "If we can make
this work here, then why
couldn't that happen in
Nigeria?"
Milwaukee Common Council
President Willie Hines Jr.,
whose 15th aldermanic district
includes North Ave., is excited
about a potential relationship
with Nigeria and hopes it will
help erase some of the stigma
associated with the central
city.
Unfortunately, there's limited
appreciation for the outstanding
success and achievements that
have occurred in the central
city. There are a number of
neighborhoods where residents
are taking back their
communities, where residents are
moving back in and you're seeing
business growth," Hines said.
"It took someone from Nigeria to
really appreciate the value of
what's happening in the
district."
Parallels to capital city
The consul general sees
parallels between the central
city and parts of northern
Nigeria, where riot-damaged
cities are being rebuilt. Auwalu
compares Milwaukee to Kano, the
economic center of northern
Nigeria and one of the oldest
and largest cities in the
region.
Like parts of the central city,
Kano, the capital of the State
of Kano, is an old industrial
city that has had stagnant
economic growth.Some parts are so old, we want
to see if we can tear those down
and build a new city within an
old city," Auwalu said. "We want
to open a discussion between
Kano state government and North
Avenue CDC to see how they can
partner and share ideas.
This could mean potential
opportunities for minority-owned
firms in Milwaukee to help in
the rebuilding of Kano and other
Nigerian cities, and North
Avenue CDC can help lead such
efforts, Auwalu said. What's
more, such a partnership might
help Milwaukee build stronger
relations with Nigerians here at
home, where the Nigerian
population is estimated to be
about 5,000.This is an opportunity to
create economic development in
poor areas of Nigeria, using
North Avenue as a model,"
Wachovia's Garba said. "If we
can get things done in Nigeria,
it's going to catch on like
fire. What they're doing on
North Avenue may not be exciting
to people here, but to
Nigerians, it's like heaven."
Imagine that. Somebody sees the
central city of Milwaukee as
heaven. It may be a stretch, but
the thought is refreshing. |