Vincennes City Council throws support behind downtown grant project

INVin executive director Ellen Harper, during a brief public hearing, said 30 property initially owners stepped forward and asked to be considered for the grant application.

Pat Jacobs, an Indianapolis architect, has, in recent weeks, inspected them all and narrowed the list of potential applicants down to 20.

That will be whittled down even further to just 12, she said, before the application is due in October.

Harper said Jacobs continues to look at the properties and put together estimates on what repairs and updates each needs, whether its new windows, tuck pointing, fresh paint or a new awning.

A committee will then be formed, Harper said, to meet with those 20 property owners to discuss the repairs or restorations Jacobs suggests as well as their potential costs.

They will be scored, she said, according to a model already being used by other Indiana Main Street communities.


“And we hope to have 12 in the end,” she said.

Property owners selected for the grant, should the city be successful, would need to be able to pay 20 percent of the total cost of their respective building restorations.

Mayor Joe Yochum encouraged city council members to get behind the process now months in the making. The city recently completed a $40,000 strategic plan for the future of downtown, a precursor and mandate to this larger grant process.

“So this is the next step,” he told the council. “We have a lot of momentum going and have seen a lot of interest from building owners, ones willing to invest their own dollars if we receive this grant.

“This is going to be amazing for Main Street,” he said. “We need to keep things moving, and I think as long as we take this next step, they will.”

Harper said those eight property owners who aren’t selected to be a part of the application — perhaps ones with relatively minor, inexpensive projects — will be directed to the Urban Enterprise Association or the city’s own Revolving Loan Fund for funding help.

Nancy Hensel with the Christian Science Reading Room, 510 Main St., said during the public hearing she was thankful for the process, regardless of whether her organization's building is chosen for the grant.

“What I have appreciated about this process is that we’re getting guidance,” she said. “We really didn’t have a sense of where we could go or what we could do (with our building). And I think we’re going to get an idea of that by the time we’re done.

“Whether we’re on the list or not, I think we’ll come out a little ahead.”

Other downtown business owners in attendance at the public hearing were Dr. Jericho Quick, Insight of the Wabash, 120 Main St.; Debbie Salters, pastor at Thursday Church; Leah Emmons, the owner of Pearl and Chrome Home Interiors, 319 Main St.; and Debbie Dickerson, who owns Riverwalk Antiques, 124 Main St.

The city council also Monday approved on first reading the expenditure of $225,000 for three of the mayor's quality-of life-endeavors.

Mayor Joe Yochum asked the council to designate $75,000 to invest in local youth sports facilities, another $50,000 that would be divided into mini grants for those wanting to restore downtown loft spaces, and another $100,000 to redo the walking path around Gregg Park.

The mayor said his plan for the first is to ask representatives from Cub League as well as the girls softball and youth soccer leagues to come forward and apply or $25,000 grants. Should a committee of elected officials deem their proposed projects and updates necessary, they would get the money to invest in their facilities.

“Our hope is that if we do this for the next two years,” the mayor said, “our youth sports facilities will be in much better shape.

“This involves our kids, our children, the future of Vincennes, and we need to make sure we have proper facilities in place for our youth.”

As for the loft program, one spearheaded by INVin, Yochum said the hope is that owners would invest in their properties and not let them deteriorate to the point of falling down, as is often the case.

“That way, we don't end up with another 401 Main St.,” he said referring to a building the city's Redevelopment Commission recently voted to pay to tear down as it was deemed unsafe.

And Gregg Park's walking track, the mayor said, is in dire need of repair. It's worth the investment, he said, as there is rarely a time when someone isn't using it.

“You go out there any given day, any given time, and you'll see someone using that trail,” he said. “But it's old, the tree roots have grown into it, and it's just in bad shape.”

Steve Beaman, superintendent of the city's Parks and Recreation Department, said the track was built with a private donation back in 1997. Today, he called it “the most used piece in the entire parks system.”

Included in the cost, he told the council, will also be about $12,000 in new fitness equipment, areas where walkers can stop and engage in other activities along the way.

Councilmen Tim Salters and Brian Grove, however, voted against the appropriations, not because they didn't want to pay to redo the walking track or even invest in youth sports. It was the loft program they had a problem with, they said.

Salters said he had “a hard time” seeing the city's tax dollars invested into privately-owned buildings. He wants to see more people living downtown, yes, but he worries about “putting public money into private hands,” especially, he said, when those same dollars could go to fill a part-time job opening or even repave a “half-mile” of road.

Grove shared his concern and said he didn't think the city's tax dollars being handed over to a “for-profit business was a good idea.”

Harper, however, said the majority of the downtown property owners that have come forward expressing interested in the matching grants — which would be offered at $5,000 and $10,000 depending on the size of the loft — planned not to rent the lofts out but to use them as their own private residences.

And with previous loft renovations running upwards of $200,000 to complete, the return on the city's investment — i.e. the increase in property tax revenue — would be generous, she said.

Yochum, too, said he thought the city would see the benefits immediately, and he compared it to other programs that use tax dollars to improve properties, ones like the state's Hardest Hit Blight Elimination Fund and even the city's own UEA and RDC.

“It's all to ensure that we spend our tax dollars wisely for the future of Vincennes,” he said. “I don't see it as apples and oranges. I see it as simple investment.

“And if you don't have a Main Street that is growing, you don't have a community that is growing,” he said. “The idea is that investment spurs investment, therefore you have more tax revenue.”

Councilman Duane Chattin also thought the program would be successful as INVin will be around to market and direct it, as will the UEA, whose members have agreed to hear from property owners and administer the mini grants as they see fit.

The first reading on the appropriation was approved with a vote of 4-2, with both Salters and Grove voting against it and Dan Ravellette, as he is the executive director of the UEA, abstaining.

The council will have to approve it on two more readings, both of which will be held when the council meets again at 6 p.m. Aug. 8 at City Hall, 201 Vigo St.