BEMIDJI

Industrial blight to gathering space.

	BEMIDJI BOOSTERS: Northwest Minnesota Foundation Senior Program Officer Jim Steenerson (left) and Bemidji City Manager Jon Chettin.

The name “Bemidji” means “flowing through or across,” and refers to how the Mississippi River flows through the lake that bears that name. The city’s location near the headwaters of the Mississippi and along the shore of Lake Bemidji has prompted this city of nearly 14,000 people to proclaim itself the “First City on the Mississippi.”

But it was the completion of the city’s Sanford Events Center along the south shore of Lake Bemidji in 2010 that allowed the city to better utilize the lake and the famous river that runs through it, said Jon Chettin, Bemidji city manager. To build the center, the city purchased 140 acres of logging and milling sites along the lake that had been abandoned brownfields for 15 years. They were cleaned up to create a mile of future commercial and residential development, with the events center as the crown jewel.

The events center brings in an estimated $12-13 million in economic activity per year and has served as the catalyst for private economic development, including a future hotel and restaurants, that will make the south shore a destination for entertainment and tourism, said Jim Steenerson, senior program officer for the Northwest Minnesota Foundation. The foundation funded planning grants for the south shore development to give the city an idea of what revitalization could look like.

“It’s one of the last major tracts of undeveloped urban land on the Mississippi River or Lake Bemidji,” said Steenerson, “so they really wanted to get it right.”

Getting it right included making sure that all the lakeshore around the events center is publicly owned, so the public can have easy access to it. City sewer and water lines, new roads and an extended hiking and biking trail that connects with the Paul Bunyan Regional Trail were also installed. The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources put in a public boat access. A hotel opened next to the events center and another might be coming soon, according to Chettin. Restaurants and residential development are also planned.

“There were already private development plans in the works,” Chettin said. “But it wouldn’t have had the trail or the public ownership of the shoreline that we have with this plan.”

ST. CLOUD

Reconnecting with the river.

In St. Cloud, steep bluffs and a history of industrial use cut the Mississippi River off from large parts of the city. But to attract jobs and residents, that needed to change. “Decades ago, the river was a tool and a resource for businesses and the community, but we’re really lifting it to a higher level of importance,” said Kathy Gaalswyk, Initiative Foundation president. “We have a unique opportunity for communities to come together to create a vision for how the river can enhance the quality of life for its residents and attract new jobs in return.”

When it came time for St. Cloud to rethink its relationship to the river, the central Minnesota city’s challenge was complicated by the fact that it shares the river with three counties and several other cities. With the help of the Initiative Foundation and the Central Minnesota Community Foundation, river enthusiasts and local governments worked past those challenges to come up with a comprehensive area plan.

RIVERFRONT REBORN: St. Cloud Mayor Dave Kleis (left), Central Minnesota Community Foundation President Steve Joul and Initiative Foundation President Kathy Gaalswyk.

The two foundations partnered to sponsor a process for St. Cloud residents to create a list of 10 top community priorities. Included in that list was a need to connect more to the Mississippi River. They got behind a joint effort between St. Cloud and neighboring Sauk Rapids and Sartell to put together a common vision for the river, said Steve Joul, Central Minnesota Community Foundation president.

“I think it will lead to more residents taking advantage of and utilizing the river as an asset,” he said. “And once we do some of these things to connect people more to the river, it’ll encourage people outside of St. Cloud to think of it as a Mississippi River city. That can be an important asset people starting or growing a business around here will consider.”

The St. Cloud Urban Area Mississippi River Master Plan has generated ideas for capitalizing on the river, including water trolleys, riverboat casinos and river walks, that the city hopes to implement if and when the moment is right according to Matt Glaesman, the city’s community development director.

The plan also identifies areas along the river that are ripe for private redevelopment to make the river a destination. “If we do a good job of rebranding ourselves and capitalizing on opportunities, I think we can see the same effect here as we’ve seen in other communities along the Mississippi,” said Glaesman. “I don’t think people know that St. Cloud is a Mississippi River city. I think that will change.”

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“We have a unique opportunity for communities to come together to create a vision for how the river can enhance the quality of life for its residents and attract new jobs in return.”
- Kathy Gaalswyk, Initiative Foundation

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An ongoing expansion of the city’s civic center and its recent renaming as the River’s Edge Convention Center offers one opportunity to increase that connection. The city has optional plans for amenities that make the riverside events center more river-friendly, including terraces, public access, boat docks and fishing piers.

ST. CROIX RIVER VALLEY

History, culture and natural resources.

Tucked along the border between Minnesota and Wisconsin, the St. Croix River is a major tributary of the Mississippi. It’s also one of the most picturesque river areas in the country.

	CHARTING A NEW COURSE: Chisago Lakes Area Chamber of Commerce Director Tangi Schaapveld.

Though it spans hundreds of miles and two states, the St. Croix has a genuine sense of place, according to Jill Shannon, director of community partnerships for the St. Croix Valley Foundation. “You feel it when you’re here, whether you’re on the Minnesota side or the Wisconsin side,” she said.

To capitalize on that sense of place, the Foundation is about to embark on the Heritage Initiative, to engage communities and individuals along the St. Croix to discuss whether designating the river as a National Heritage Area would be a good way to promote and conserve the region’s historic, cultural and natural resources.

The designation would allow local residents to work regionally on historic preservation, economic restoration, redevelopment and arts and culture to brand the area and promote regional cooperation. The area’s Swedish heritage is a big draw for tourism, especially from Scandinavia, said Tangi Schaapveld, director of the Chisago Lakes Area Chamber of Commerce. Promoting the area as a whole could magnify the region’s marketing dollars and extend its brand.

While discussions will take more than two years to complete and involve 22 community meetings spread out over 8,000 square miles and two states, Shannon thinks that resident involvement is key. “This has to be a large scale, community-centered movement,” she said. “Together we can go a long way to protect the natural and historic qualities that make this place special, doing what no single organization can do alone.”

MINNEAPOLIS AND ST. PAUL

An urban culture and natural corridor.

Twenty-five years ago, Minneapolis’ Mississippi riverfront consisted of mills, industrial sites and warehouses. “People who lived by the river were more likely to go to one of the city’s lakes than to have ever seen the riverfront,” said Cordelia Pierson, executive director of the Minneapolis Riverfront Partnership.

Today, downtown Minneapolis’ riverfront neighborhoods are thriving. Home to renovated lofts that are inhabited by many of the city’s civic leaders, they also celebrate Minneapolis’ heritage not only as a milling city, but also as a town with world class arts and culture.

TWO CITIES, ONE RIVER: St. Paul Riverfront Corporation Executive Director Patrick Seeb and Minneapolis Riverfront Partnership Executive Director Cordelia Pierson.

The Mill City Museum, built out of the ruins of an old mill, overlooks St. Anthony falls. Next door, the new Guthrie Theater brings drama enthusiasts by the thousands. The historic Stone Arch Bridge links both sides of the river for pedestrians and bicyclists.

In St. Paul, 17 years of efforts to reconnect with the river have yielded the Great River Passage, a system of parks and trails along 17 miles of riverfront that provides people with a natural river experience in an urban setting, according to Patrick Seeb, executive director of the St. Paul Riverfront Corporation.

Along with the renovation of Harriet Island as an entertainment and recreation space, the 1999 construction of the Science Museum of Minnesota and a total of $750 million in public and private development that included 800 housing units, the city’s relationship to the river has been transformed. “It’s been the chief part of more than $3 billion in reinvestment in the downtown over the past 10 to 15 years,” said Seeb. “Lawson Software relocated here from industrial space in Minneapolis partly because their employees wanted somewhere they could go outside.”

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“Lawson Software relocated here from industrial space in Minneapolis partly because their employees wanted somewhere they could go outside."
- Patrick Seeb | St. Paul Riverfront Corportaion

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In fact, the Twin Cities’ embrace of the river has been so successful that there are more plans underway. A newly unveiled Great River Park Plan outlines the next 20 years of St. Paul’s investment in the river, including an environmental education center that could be home to a National Park Service headquarters.

Minneapolis is looking to revitalize the riverfront above St. Anthony Falls as well, said Ann Calvert, project coordinator with Minneapolis Community Planning and Economic Development Department. “We learned a lot during the renovation of our central riverfront,” she said. “But we’ll need to learn more to do the upper riverfront. No two places on the river are exactly the same and they require different approaches.”

DUBUQUE

Riverfront rags to riches

When a devastating 1965 flood started a long, slow decline that picked up steam with the farm crisis of the 1980s, one of Dubuque, Iowa’s major employers closed. As the other prominent employer started laying people off, the riverfront was an industrial blight.

Those hardships actually paved the way for a renaissance. “We started tackling the brownfields and taking down the storage tanks. We built a river walk on top of the flood wall,” said Nancy Van Milligen, executive director of the Community Foundation of Greater Dubuque.

	NEW FRONT DOOR: Community Foundation of Greater Dubuque Executive Director Nancy Van Milligan.

At the same time, the Dubuque County Historical Society decided to expand its Mississippi River museum into a national facility that includes an aquarium. They ended up broadening their vision to make the museum a national facility that includes an aquarium.

With those efforts underway, a partnership emerged with the city to renovate the riverfront around the museum. It became the America’s River project, a $188 million riverfront renovation that rebuilt 90 acres of riverfront in a two-year span.

In addition to creating a town people want to live in, the renovation made residents feel more personally invested in the river. “It transformed our community,” said Terri Goodman, director of national advancement for the National Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium in Dubuque. “We found that engaging people directly with the river and providing hands-on experiences creates the greatest advocacy group for the river you could want. The more we made the river accessible, the more people wanted to protect it.”

Private development followed, including the opening of a new McGraw-Hill global headquarters for higher education publishing and the recruitment of IBM, which brough 1,300 high-tech jobs to the city.

Now, instead of being an afterthought, the Mississippi River “is actually our front door,” Van Milligen said.

EAST GRAND FORKS

From natural disaster to opportunity

East Grand Forks might be a long way from the Mississippi, but the city of 8,600 residents on the Red River in Minnesota’s northwest corner could give other river towns a glimpse of what’s possible when you have no other choice but to rebuild your riverfront.

MAYOR LYNN STAUSS: “We had to decide to run from the river or embrace it.”

In 1997, East Grand Forks and its sister city of Grand Forks, N.D., were overrun by the Red River in an historic flood, that caused massive damage to the city’s downtown and riverfront.

“We had to make the decision to run from the river or embrace it,” said East Grand Forks Mayor Lynn Stauss. “We felt that the river was a natural thing that people liked to look at. We didn’t want to wall ourselves off from it.”

With significant help from the federal and state government, East Grand Forks was able to rebuild, starting with construction of “invisible” flood walls that control floodwaters but also allow people to see and access the river.

The demolition of 400 homes in the flood plain created the opportunity to build a state recreational park along the river, which has become a draw for tourists from Canada and other locations. The city’s downtown now has an entertainment district along the river that has brought several major restaurants and a movie theater.

That revitalization attracted a Cabela’s outdoor outfitting store, which attracts more tourists across the border for shopping. East Grand Forks has become “the poster child for flood recovery around the nation,” said Jim Steenerson, senior program manager for the Northwest Minnesota Foundation. “They were open to embracing the river as an asset instead of a threat. And with early planning and lots of community involvement, it has really paid off.” IQ