This interview originally appeared in the October 2024 issue of Town&Gown magazine.
Lee Anne Jeffries says she loves downtown State College because it’s a walkable small town with the vibrancy of a big city.
“I personally love it in the summer when it’s quiet, and I love it when the students come back because of the energy it provides,” says Jeffries, executive director of the Downtown State College Improvement District. “You don’t get that anywhere else that you go.”
And Jeffries doesn’t hesitate to address the perceived elephant in the room:
Parking.
“I think that’s the number one barrier for folks to come downtown.”
She’s working to spread the word about a longstanding program that still flies under the radar. Most merchants offer free vouchers for customers who park in the Beaver, Fraser or Pugh garages. Just ask. The DSCID provides three-hour validations for those who stop in its office on Fraser Street Monday through Friday. (The program doesn’t apply to meters or the McAllister parking deck.)
“It’s something we’ve had since well before my time, but I think it’s not really well known out in the community. … We want to make sure people understand that we’re here to make it a little bit easier to come downtown and park for free,” she says.
The DSCID consists of about 350 member organizations that sit within its downtown boundaries (Atherton Street to Sowers Street, College Avenue to Highland Alley). Jeffries has been with the organization for six years, the last three-plus as its director.
The DSCID, along with the borough’s Redevelopment Authority, took a big step this spring aimed at filling some vacancies downtown and retaining other businesses through the appointment of Kendra Kielbasa as retail and commercial business advocate; the new position is jointly funded by both organizations.
“It’s a great collaborative effort to really see these things through infilling those vacancies that are downtown and being supportive of those folks—the brokers and ownership—to see what we can do to help,” Jeffries says.
Here’s more from our conversation:
How are efforts going to fill some of those vacant commercial spaces in the new student high-rises?
Jeffries: I think with having Kendra here, we’re kind of dispelling some myths. We haven’t had the capability and the bandwidth of this office to do some of that outreach that she’s doing, so really talking to the ownership and the brokers, there is a concerted effort to fill these spaces. I think within the next nine months to a year we’re going to see many of them fill. That’s the exciting news. We’re also learning more about how these owners are working with potential tenants; they are willing to work with them to get the right fit. They’re looking for someone that’s going to be there for 10 years down the road. So, it’s not that easy of a fit sometimes.
[Jeffries notes recent plans for Buffalo Wild Wings and Tropical Smoothie Cafe to open in The Maxxen high-rise on Hiester Street, along with efforts to explore the best use for other commercial spaces in that building.]
When you’re out there talking to businesses, what are the biggest selling points for locating in downtown State College?
Jeffries: The town is growing. There’s a network of people that come here and stay. I am a local that moved away and came back. You’re seeing that all the time.
The Happy Valley Adventure Bureau just came out with numbers on visitors, five million that are coming to Centre County and State College. We are the economic driver of the county, so many of them will be coming through the downtown area. It looks great for downtown businesses aside from the three months of the year when the students leave. They have to plan for that. If you go in with a solid business plan, knowing that, you can be very, very successful here.
How do you see the balance now between catering to a large student population and adults who live or visit here?
Jeffries: I think we’re getting there. There was a time where locals felt like there wasn’t the fine-dining option. I think Allen Street Grill and the new ownership over there has done a phenomenal job. The Tavern is thriving, and with Central Reservation added to the mix, we’re reaching some of those spots that people like. We have a wonderful amount of diverse ethnic restaurants downtown that maybe our locals don’t know about, some wonderful spots that you may not expect. I think retail in general is a challenge, and has been, so food and beverage is really where it’s at right now, but it is finding that nice mix.
You represent a diverse group of businesses. Is that a challenge sometimes to get everyone on the same page?
Jeffries: It can be a challenge. It’s one of the things I enjoy about my job, because it’s never boring and certainly finding a middle ground can be a challenge. But I like that about what I do. And yes, they’re not always on the same page. There are general themes that most of them will agree upon, and we go from there because we represent all of them. We want to make sure that every voice is heard.
You’ve recently visited several college towns—Blacksburg and Charlottesville in Virginia, and Ann Arbor and East Lansing, Michigan. How did that go?
Jeffries: I love meeting with the folks that are peers of mine in those roles, meeting with some of the tourism folks, anyone that’s willing to sit down and just collaborate, commiserate and compare challenges and opportunities. That’s been invaluable to what I do here. We’re different than every town we visited; there’s no one that is a clear cookie-cutter of State College. But commonalities run throughout all of these downtowns, and the challenges are very similar: programming, events, parking challenges, all those things that we deal with in a downtown. It’s wonderful to have some folks to bounce ideas off of.
Were there things you saw in those communities that you’d love to bring here?
Jeffries: We’re looking toward some way-finding in downtown State College. A lot of those college towns do a very good job of that. We recently added 20 huge planters downtown. You can’t miss them. That was based on some visits. I think beautification projects go a really long way in a downtown like ours. And then some little public art and some other sorts of initiatives like that have been very interesting to learn more about. And simple things. We have a downtown map and guide that you can get in our office, you can get several places, but East Lansing literally had them sitting at every parking garage elevator. Why didn’t we think of that, right? So, it goes from something small to something large, like way-finding, which obviously we’ll have to get the borough looped in and get some funding for.
Summers on Allen was about to happen in 2020, and then COVID struck and it hasn’t happened. Is it still a possibility to close a portion of Allen Street [for a pedestrian plaza] in the summertime?
Jeffries: We’re still in talks with the Centre Foundation, which has the funding for that project. We see that as something that the community has been pretty vocal about. We always take a community survey at the end of the year and we really do make decisions for the future based on some of those answers. It’s a common theme.
We are going through a construction season; part of that in the future will be some work to that 100 block of Allen, and it has to do with the crosswalks, the intersection, and the curb maintenance. And I think once that work is complete, it might be a little bit of a seamless closure in that they’re removing some of the curbs and the barriers to close the street. So personally, I would love to wait for a project like that until that street is ready to go. It could be next year. It could be the following. I don’t have a definite timeline on that, and it all is based on that Calder Way construction as well.
But I do think there’s potential to go down that road again and talk through that, and we certainly want to be a partner in that, make sure it’s done well, because if it’s done the first time and not done well, we will never be able to do it again. My philosophy is, let’s do it right the first time, and you need to get the businesses, a lot of collaboration and brainstorming to make it work.
What’s your favorite thing about downtown?
Jeffries: My favorite thing is we live in a small town. We’ve all either lived in cities or been to cities, and there’s a certain vibrancy when you go to a city. Not everybody wants to live in one but our town is so small and wonderful that the core of the downtown is a vibrant and fun place to be. … You go to North Atherton and maybe get everything you need there, but you don’t get the vibrancy of a really walkable, family-friendly downtown until you come here. And I think that’s special. T&G
Mark Brackenbury is a former editor of Town&Gown.
