A discussion with Chillicothe’s city administrator about Livable Streets
By Sarah Canavese
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| Courtesy: City of Chillicothe |
Imagine walking down the sidewalks of a charming downtown
area in Missouri. Around you are the brightly colored awnings of a locally
owned businesses, and just up ahead, there’s a group of teenagers going into
the ice cream shop. It’s summer, and hot, and now that you think of it, all
this walking is making you hungry, too. You should go into the ice cream shop
as well, but on your way there, you see a shoe store. It’s August, time for
back to school, and your kids could use a new pair.
Can you imagine this scene unfolding? Ike Holland,
Chillicothe city administrator can and he is working on creating the perfect
place for tourism to bloom. One key to achieving his goal of vibrant tourism is
through the Missouri Livable Streets project.
Holland spent eight years working in Colorado, giving him
first-hand experience with how a town that thrives on tourism should look.
“When I came to Missouri and I saw this Livable Streets program, I was glad
because people don’t see the quality of life benefits or the economic benefits,
unless they have experienced it. So it was a very easy sell, [it] wasn’t much
of a sell for me,” Holland explains.
For Chillicothe, though, before Holland can share the
benefits of creating livable streets, he has to generate the interest among
residents and stakeholders.
“I know it works,” Holland said of building tourism through
livable streets. “You have to take it in stride and understand that we are
doing this in stages. I am confident and when it’s complete, each stage gains
momentum because people start to understand what is going on. In Colorado, you
are so dependent on tourism and we used to say, ‘We will get others to pay for
our projects.’ So the tourists, they pay for the highways, the hot springs, the
ski resorts. [Communities] don’t realize the people who live there don’t pay
for it, it’s the tourism [that does].”
Part of the hesitance communities may experience when
considering policies encouraging livable streets often is due to these concerns
about cost. “For the street planning that was done 20 or 30 years ago,” said
Holland, “the norm was to do away with the sidewalks and reduce cost as much as
possible. Crosswalks were minimized to save money. Now we are having to go back
and basically redo a lot of these main roads. It’s a shame that sidewalks went
out of style.”
Continues Holland, “The funding for streets is provided by
the sales tax here in the community and it hasn’t increased over the years, but
the cost of materials and labor has. So every year, I get less for my dollar
but still have to maintain the streets. It’s a tough choice for communities to
make, but the community is behind the projects. We built a new hospital and we
are going to include sidewalks as part of the project. We are also implementing
some really nice streetlights to go along the sidewalks.”
It should come as no surprise then that any hesitance around
passing a policy doesn’t stop Holland from feeling the excitement this project
has brought on. “In the bigger scheme of things, yes it [may] cost money. But
the bang for the buck is big.”
Holland emphasizes that making the changes now will benefit
the community in the long-term. “In about ten to 15 years, 25 percent of the
population is going to be over 65 [years old]. One of the things people over 65
like to do is walk. If you have a small or large town that encourages walking,
and you can do it in a safe way, you will do it. That’s step one. The second
step is tourism. All those things combined are reasons why we are looking at
making Chillicothe a very livable community.”
To learn more visit Missouri Livable Streets.
