A forum allowed attendees to discuss ways to improve the capital city.
On Monday, a local media outlet hosted a public forum to discuss ideas to revitalize Downtown Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
Attendees focused on the city’s status as the state capitol, its culture, and ways to revitalize unused spaces.
Harrisburg struggles with high poverty levels, and since the pandemic, it has struggled to rebound.
Reinvestment downtown has been a recent topic of discussion. Justin Browning, owner of JB Lovedraft’s, converted the former Federal Taphouse bar into a new live music venue on Second Street.
While reinvestments like these are important, poverty and crime continue to be a problem in Harrisburg city.
Following the COVID-19 pandemic and shutdown, remote work took state workers out of the capital city. Incidents of violent crime, increasing homelessness, and businesses leaving the city have taken a toll.
Tripp Muldrow, a keynote speaker at Monday’s event, suggested the city shift its focus from parking and towards making the downtown community a place where locals thrive.
“You go downtown to eat. You go downtown to walk. You go downtown to experience the community. And this goes to another point that was brought up, is that we build our downtowns for humans, not for cars. We build our downtowns for people who live, people who live in our cities,” he said, earning applause from attendees.
“And when the tourists come, that’s the bonus… We want the folks who live in our regions and our communities to come to our downtowns to walk on the street. Parking is a utility to get you to that end,” he continued.
Another floated idea was converting unused office buildings into residential apartment buildings.
Harrisburg’s Zoning Hearing Board was asked this summer to consider zoning variances that would permit the conversion of two current office buildings with a total of 21 units.
Another office building in Dauphin County is set to be converted to a residential building with 39 units for people aged 55 years and older.
Another issue that is anticipated is encouraging local businesses to relocate into the downtown area again after being pushed out due to lack of business or the city’s current circumstances with crime and poverty.
With a contested mayoral election between incumbent Mayor Wanda Williams and current City Treasurer Dan Miller coming up, the discussion event focused on ways to develop a plan independent of City Hall that will survive changes in the future mayor’s office.
