There was a stretch of years when people in Florence talked about
downtown the way you'd talk about a lost cause.
The Florence Downtown Development Corporation's own history of the area
describes how downtown was once written off by some as “a drunk too far
gone to be saved.” Storefronts sat empty. Investors treated the area as
too risky to touch. Three separate attempts to jumpstart a turnaround
had already failed.
Then the cost of that decline started showing up in places city leaders
couldn't ignore. According to the Downtown Development Corporation, the
area's lack of vibrancy contributed directly to the city losing out on
two industrial recruitment prospects, and two major healthcare
facilities struggled to recruit doctors and staff because of it. A
struggling downtown wasn't just a downtown problem anymore.
What the decline was costing
2
industrial recruitment prospects the city lost, tied directly to
downtown's lack of vibrancy
3
attempts to jumpstart a turnaround that had already failed before
the work finally took hold
In 2011, the city adopted a new Downtown Master Plan with a five-year
implementation timeline, built on community focus groups, interviews,
and a citizen's delegation. Two years later, in 2013, a group of local
investors stepped in to help drive the redevelopment forward.
1999
Downtown written off by some as “a drunk too far gone to be saved.”
Storefronts empty, investors wary, three false starts already behind
it.
2011
The city adopts a new Downtown Master Plan with a five-year
implementation timeline — shaped by focus groups, interviews, and a
citizen's delegation.
2013
A group of local investors steps in to help drive the redevelopment
forward.
2023
Downtown Florence receives the Great American Main Street Award —
the top national honor for preservation-based downtown
revitalization.
What followed was a decade of slow, compounding change: new restaurants,
new housing, a rebuilt cultural district anchored by the Florence County
Museum and the FMU Performing Arts Center, and streetscape work that
turned empty blocks back into places people wanted to walk. By the time
the results were tallied, the effort had produced more than 100 new
housing units, roughly $300 million in investment, and more than 90 new
businesses downtown.
100+
new housing units downtown
~$300M
in investment
90+
new businesses downtown
In 2023, the recognition caught up with the work. Downtown Florence
received the
Great American Main Street Award, the top national honor for preservation-based downtown
revitalization. Main Street Program Manager Hannah Davis put it plainly:
downtown had gone from “too far gone to be saved” to
“the place to be, to live, and to do business in our
region.”
“...the place to be, to live, and to do business in our
region.”
That's not the end of the story. The city has since set a new goal,
1,000 new residential units downtown by 2030, and that chapter is still
being written in real time. But the turnaround itself, from written-off
to nationally awarded, is one of the clearest examples of what patient,
unglamorous civic work can actually do to a place.
What's your downtown memory?
The empty years, the first new restaurant you tried, or the day you
noticed it had actually turned a corner? Tell us in the comments.
