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Meeting late in December, members of SPIR's executive committee transferred $10,000 from their executive director's salary to the organization's facade grant program, making up to 10 addition $1,000 awards possible between now and June 30. (SPIR has been without a director since Richard McHargue went to work as Sylva town manager a year ago.)
"SPIR believes that the best use of funds, at present, is for direct use in revitalization, rather than for administrative purposes," said SPIR President Russ Seagle. "Our budgeted facade grant funds had been depleted, so it made good sense to take a look at our budget to see if funds could be reallocated to support further facade improvement opportunities for property and business owners downtown."
A part of SPIR's plan for revitalizing downtown Sylva, the facade grant program was started in 1996 with funds from the town of Sylva. Since then the program has helped to leverage private investment, said Rodney Swink, director of the N.C. Office of Urban Development, which oversees the state's Main Street Program, of which Sylva is a part.
"Using a small pot of funds to match those of property owners is a great way to stimulate redevelopment," Swink said. "It encourages people to consider improving their property, which is the first step towards more significant reinvestment."
Downtown property owners are invited to apply for matching grants of up to $1,000 by using one of two methods, said Odell Thompson, chairman of SPIR's design committee.
"They can either come up with a design on their own or they can use the services of the design committee," Thompson said. "If we help them with a design, it is more likely to be approved for funding."
The criteria used for approving facade grant requests are similar to those used by the U.S. Secretary of the Interior's office for improving historic buildings, said Thompson.
"However, those standards are not always appropriate for buildings that are not historic," he said. "For these buildings, we use best judgment and accepted design guidelines."
The SPIR design committee can assist with everything from paint colors to awning and window styles, exterior doors and signage. Even property owners who wish to rid their business exteriors of exposed utility items, including propane tanks, excess wires and air conditioning units, could quality for grant funds, he said.
For example, when downtown property owner David Schulman approached the design committee for assistance with his building, which houses Sylva Insurance and the Jackson County Red Cross office, the first order of business was to guess that a third louver was hidden under the metal siding that had been applied across the exterior of the second floor.
"During our research, we learned that the building had originally been a theater," Thompson explained. "The old carbon arc projectors produced a lot of heat. So instead of windows, the louvers were installed to allow heat to escape."
In the new design, custom windows were built to give the building a "lived-in" appearance, even though the space is barely 5 feet high. Also, the blue trim on the first-floor windows and doors has been replaced with aluminum, a green awning will soon be installed and the exterior has been cleaned.
"These were all simple steps, but the building looks much better," Thompson said of the near-finished product.
Since SPIR's designated area of assistance reaches from the courthouse to the Coffee Shop traveling west to east and from Jackson Street to Railroad Avenue south to north, board members recently decided that a property owner with building exteriors facing both Main and Mill streets may qualify for two separate facade grants.
That was the case for Joe and Annie Ritota, owners of Annie's Bakery. Open since last April, the bakery's Main Street entrance recently received a new paint job and will soon sport a new awning. Additionally, a damaged cornice on the roof line has been repaired, as have damaged tiles below the front windows.
Plans for the back of the building call for the removal of propane plumbing and other conduit, restoration of the second-floor steel windows, and paint to help hide utilities that cannot be removed.
"It's truly awesome that the downtown revitalization group is helping businesses put on a new face to bring more folks downtown," Annie Ritota said. "I really think it's wonderful and that our downtown is looking so much better."
Ritota, who came to Jackson County three years ago, said she and her husband felt strongly that the back of their building should look as good as the front.
"We wanted the back to match the front," she said of the decision to pursue two separate grants from SPIR. "Also, we wanted to help Mill Street look nicer. We thought it was important to spif up the back for those who travel to Sylva that way."
"Studies have shown that businesses that improve their physical appearance are more likely to see an increase in customer traffic and sales," Swink said.
While critics have said that facade enhancement programs are nothing more than one group's way of remaking a downtown into the image they prefer, both Seagle and Swink point out that individuality plays a key role in an area's rebirth.
"Sylva will always be unique because of the architectural diversity and geography downtown," Seagle said. "The goal of the facade grant program is not to 'homogenize' Sylva, but to help restore buildings, as close as possible, to their original beauty."
"Main Street facade grant programs are intended to address each property individually, reinforcing the uniqueness of local architecture and building styles," said Swink. "It is new construction that is creating a 'sameness' across America, not rehabilitation and renovation.
"And good design assistance is not a matter of taste; it is a matter of reinforcing the best features of a building and removing or minimizing the negative ones," he continued. "While some may argue about color schemes and awning designs, reinforcing the basic features of good architecture is the intent of facade grant programs."
For more information on how to apply for a SPIR facade improvement grant, call 586-1577.
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Thanks in part to a $1,000 facade improvement matching grant from Sylva Partners in Renewal, downtown property owner David Schulman has taken several steps toward enhancing the appearance of his building. SPIR design committee Chairman Odell Thompson used these "before" (above) and "after" photos to illustrate how simple improvements could enhance the appearance of the building, which was built as a theater in 1927 and is now home to Sylva Insurance and the Jackson County Red Cross office. With many of the changes complete, the building's appearance is more consistent with the time it was constructed.
