Editorial
Front Page - Friday, April 2, 2010
RiverCity Company wants Chattanoogans to work, play and live downtown
Erica Tuggle
Kim White has worked as the president of the RiverCity Company since July of 2009. The company has had a role in the development of the aquarium, Creative Discovery Museum, the Majestic theatre and the current redevelopment of the Bijou Theatre.
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The vibrancy and beauty of the structures that make up downtown Chattanooga range from modern and sleek, to artistic and enchanting as well as including the classic landmarks such as the Tennessee Aquarium. Picking out the impressive architecture is easy. Identifying a Chattanooga riverfront structure that the RiverCity Company hasn’t had a role in is where it gets difficult.
Kim White, the president of the RiverCity Company, says that although they have been involved with the establishment of the aquarium, Creative Discovery Museum, the Lookouts stadium, two of the major downtown hotels, the new Majestic theatre and the Museum Bluffs structure, what she loves about the organization is their behind the scenes nature in moving Chattanooga forward.
“I am so proud to be part of an organization that has done so much for the community, but quite honestly, hasn’t been an organization that has tried to get credit for it,” she says.
White has been the president of RiverCity since July of 2009 and was on the board for two years prior, as the former CEO of Luken Holdings, which has over two million square feet of real estate, half of which is downtown. She was on the search committee for the new RiverCity president, when she realized at a round table discussion that the description of the person for the job was the face in the mirror.
“I am passionate about downtown, and it’s a neat role to be able to get up every morning and work on issues that make our downtown better,” she says.
Since her appointment to the position, the RiverCity Company has been doing a top to bottom reorganization of reevaluating community needs, gaps in services and the company’s role in moving forward, she says. As part of this restructure, the company decided to move away from its role as an event planning organization and toward a distinction as a support organization and a merchants organization for the community as well as working with the Chamber of Commerce on downtown recruitment, White says.
This decision resulted in the dissolving of the Chattanooga Downtown partnership, a branch of RiverCity company that had put on the Nightfall free concert series. With this change, the RiverCity Company will still be involved in downtown banners and the Grand Illumination, and has contracted Chattanooga Presents to continue to hold Nightfall, White says. Carla Pritchard, the former head of the Downtown Partnership, has started this event company, and work on a Nightfall Web site is in progress, White says.
“No one should see any difference in this year’s Nightfall when it kicks off Memorial Day weekend,” she says.
White says the main goal of their work is to have more people living, working and playing downtown.
“My goal is to be able to walk out my front door downtown and see the town filled with all sorts of people,” she says.
The company is working on an interactive Web site to show all of the possible living options for downtown and that will allow people to tell their stories about downtown living, White says.
“There are a lot more options downtown than people think. I think showing the variety of people and income levels that do live downtown, and telling those real stories will make a difference.”
The new campaign the RiverCity Company plans to unfurl within the next three months will include a targeted approach on encouraging Chatta-noogans to move downtown as well as promoting the new apartment developments announced; one in the Bluff View area of 100 units and another at the corner of Market Street and Main Street of 42 units.
The RiverCity Company is also working to bring the over 10,000 students from UTC into the city by informing them about the city’s offerings as well as educating merchants of the impact of these students on their businesses. White says they have held pep-rallies downtown, allowed students to paint storefronts blue and gold for one of the football games and are responsible for the 30 to 40 downtown merchants who offer student discounts. Future plans include holding a kick-off for new students downtown as well as getting information about downtown restaurants and retailers to them quicker.
Since the company’s last project completion of the Cormike Majestic 12, they are now turning their vision to redeveloping the Bijou Theatre and deciding what amenity they can bring to downtown with the structure, White says.
They are also planning to recruit more retail services, as they have begun to do on Warehouse Row with offering incentives in façade money for retailers to locate downtown.
White says she realizes that the RiverCity Company has made an impact as she sees the increase of private development downtown.
“What I think is so great, is that we laid a foundation that encourages private developers to come in and do some great projects,” she says.
It is definitely a ground-breaking beginning.
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