News from the Noteworthy by Mark Drnek

Painting the Picture of an Oneonta Renaissance

“There is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.”—Vincent van Gogh

If you love our little City of the Hills, if you wish to see it thrive, and your neighbors’ businesses flourish, I ask that you consider joining our crusade to make Oneonta the creative showcase for our area.

We’re launching an effort that will transform our downtown and make it a destination for locals and visitors. A place to explore. A place to appreciate. A place that surprises. A place that inspires.

To the benefit of our shops and restaurants—a place whose energy and vitality beckons, inviting a stroll along Main Street and time spent in newly conceived and engaging public spaces—I paint the picture of a Downtown Renaissance.

In the mid-20th century, Oneonta was the mecca and the “place to be.” In this new paradigm, we’ll find reconnection to our vibrant past as well as to our possibility and potential.

This is not aspiration for aspiration’s sake. This is our necessity.

The dominance of downtowns long ago yielded to malls and strip malls, which have, in turn, struggled in an age of digital shopping and overnight delivery.

Downtowns that have succeeded have been those that have reinvented themselves. And that is what Oneonta must—and will—do.

Our city must become a place where at any time of the day, on any day of the week, a visitor will find compelling and entertaining opportunities for an enhanced Main Street experience. A trip to Oneonta must be a “to-do list” item, where those hours spent will be memorable and soon repeated. Where sidewalks are shared with dozens of others who are equally invested in their exploration, and in their interactions with the creative offerings in our quaint and historic downtown.

It’s the nature and substance of those interactions that we must make our focus and our priority.

To enhance the opportunities for engaging connection, I propose a reimagination of our shared space. I’ll be asking the Common Council to permanently close Dietz Street from Main to Wall streets, making it a pedestrian-friendly space for food and crafts vendors, artists, artisans, and performers. I will seek the relocation of the Farmers Market to that area, and as it grows (with the city’s support) into an already reinvigorated Muller Plaza.

In Muller Plaza, we will build a jewel box of a performance stage and, in doing so, honor our own legend of jazz, Al Gallodoro. And we will continue the organic growth of the plaza’s use as a place for dining, relaxing, and entertainments.

The “Alleys off Dietz” and an accessible, connective, and expanded Water Street will provide an additional and sizeable canvas for the creative output of visual and performing arts.

But it will be the invitation and support of our local artists, and the embrace of their creative energies, that will spur our “renaissance” and make Oneonta the most interesting place you could call home. Interested in playing a part? Call me.

Mark Drnek is the mayor of the City of Oneonta.