Downtown revitalisation – bringing a government program to life

Jeff Green | Oct 21, 2020

Adrianna Barbary did most of her growing up in Perth, but has longstanding family ties to the Sharbot Lake area. After studying business communications at Brock University in St. Catherines, she worked in marketing in both Toronto and Vancouver.

She was living in Toronto when COVID hit this spring and it made her re-evaluate her life in the big city. She saw the job posting for a one year position coordinating an initiative aimed at determining an economic future that fits the needs for the hub community of Sharbot Lake and its residents, she jumped at the chance to return to both Perth and Sharbot Lake.

Since late July, she has been on a crash course in how the Downtown Revitalisation Program works. The program was developed by the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs OMAFRA. It includes one component that was already coming to fruition by the time Barbary arrived to work at the Central Frontenac Township office this summer: physical improvements including streetscaping and parking.

Sharbot Lake was in the midst of having the three streets, in its core section, torn out and replaced in a $3.2 million infrastructure project that had been originally scheduled for the end of 2020 into 2021, but had been pushed forward when it became clear that the summer of 2020 was going to be quieter than a normal summer in the hamlet, due to COVID-19.

The other initiatives in the program have more to do with the will of the local community to move forward. They include: helping existing businesses get new customers, bringing more businesses into the downtown core, and promoting the downtown.

Part of the application process for project funding, which was sought in a joint initiative between the township and Frontenac County, required that a local group be engaged in the process from the start. The township’s economic development committee took that role on.

Since arriving on the scene, Barbary has been undergoing training in the specifics of the program and doing research to learn about the various groups and organisations that make the local community tick.

“I needed to familiarise myself with all of the groups who play a role in the community: Villages Beautiful, the Railway Heritage Committee and others, and with Community Services, Community Living, and the businesses and organisations that make Sharbot Lake a commercial and service hub for Central Frontenac,” she said. “I’m excited to move to the next phase, connecting with businesses and residents.”

That phase began on Wednesday night (October 21) with a Zoom-based meeting/video introduction to the program, for a group of business owners.

“It was a lot more difficult to organise than a live meeting would have been. I did not want it to be another Zoom meeting, so it will be a combination of pre-recorded and live elements,” she said.

The meeting will be posted on the Central Frontenac website later this week, and there is also a resource page about the Downtown Revitalization Project on the site. centralfrontenac.com/en/business/downtown-revitalization.aspx

Barbary will be arranging to meet as many people as possible to get a sense of what they are hoping for from Sharbot Lake over the next 10 years or so.

She is planning to do a written residents survey, but one of the main sources of information for the project will come from impromptu conversations with people as they go about their lives in the hamlet.

Normally, that would be done at community gatherings throughout the fall and Christmas season, but this is not a normal time, so she is having to find different ways to connect with people.

“I will be at the flu clinic on the 31st at Granite Ridge Education Centre. It should be a great way to meet people as they are waiting for their flu shot.”