City of Creighton Kicks Off Downtown Revitalization: Phase I

The City of Creighton was awarded $30,000 from the state, and the city matched 25% for a downtown revitalization project in Creighton.  

More than 30 people attended the kick off Downtown Revitalization Committee meeting on Thursday afternoon.
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Brenda Jensen, Community Planner for Miller and Associates, facilitated the planning phase discussion for this project.

"It’s a 25 cents on the dollar, so that’s a great investment for the community to take advantage of the grant funds that are available through the state," Jensen said.

In this planning phase, the Phase I grant pays for Miller and Associates to gather data and input to prepare for the grant application for Phase II, the project phase which will be applied this summer. 

Creighton Economic Development Director Abigail Frank said, “The meeting today was the initial kick off meeting for our planning phase that the state awarded us. Miller and Associates came in did a strengths and weaknesses analysis of our community and the direction they would like Creighton to go in and what the business district would like to see.” 

Jensen expressed the value of this downtown revitalization project for the community. 

“This downtown revitalization project is extremely important to Creighton for several reasons, one being that it is the heart of the community," Jensen said. "Anything that we can do to revitalize, improve, continue to promote growth in the downtown district benefits the whole community."

Being the scenes, Miller and Associates will compile information they have gathered from Thursday’s meeting and their on-site research to further expand on the discussed ideas and develop a group goal or vision for the community. 

“We are looking at this fully. We are looking at it from the business aspect, facades, infrastructure, the conditions of the buildings, parking, pedestrian safety and beautification. This plan will be very beneficial for the community moving forward," Jensen said. "We will bring that back in a draft version for the next meeting to discuss with the Creighton community."

The next meeting will take place at the end of March or early April.

“We will have a discussion focused on what Miller and Associates came up with in their analysis and talk more in depth about what potential Creighton has for the business district," Frank said.

Residents and business owners are encouraged to brainstorm what they want to see in the business district for the next meeting. 

“This is a long-term plan, but we have to look at what we are going to do with the Phase II grant funds. We need to know that the priority is to accomplish first,” Jensen said.