Kissimmee Main Street History
Kissimmee received a Main Street designation in 1997 Bureau of Historic Preservation under Main Street Florida, located in Tallahassee and the National Main Street Center in Washington, D.C. The purpose of the program is to promote economic development in Kissimmee’s Main Street area by bringing in patrons, new business, and assisting existing businesses to flourish while preserving the historic feel of the downtown area.
In the beginning Kissimmee Main Street functioned under the Community Redevelopment Agency. The CRA was about to embark on a major streetscape project and felt they needed the assistance of the Main Street Program to help receive funding for and to retain the businesses in the downtown area. A few of their projects included:
• Established the Downtown Business guide (now maintained by the DBA)
• Eco and Heritage tourism guide – (now maintained by the CVB)
• The first Kissimmee Main Street Economic Restructuring Committee became the Economic Development Committee which is an advisory committee to CRA
• Kissimmee Main Street utilized the $10,000 from Florida Main Street to begin the façade grants program (now maintained by the CRA)
• Established the Historic House tour of 7 historic homes in downtown Kissimmee which ran for 3 years drawing about 600 viewers
• Established the Historic Kissimmee Ornaments (currently maintained by the DBA)
• Coordinated street parties for 18 months drawing in 3600 to downtown Kissimmee
• Provided technical assistance to businesses downtown during the streetscape project in the form of a “tool kit” binder with helpful dates and other information as well as assistance by way of monthly workshops for business owners
As you can see, Kissimmee Main Street was very busy. Some of their efforts can still be seen today through projects initiated by Kissimmee Main Street and currently maintained today through other organizations. The efforts made by Kissimmee Main Street proved to be successful. After 8 long months of torn up streets, closed roads, and frustrated patron and business owners, the streetscape project was complete without the loss of one single business. However, due to other obligation to extensive capital improvement the CRA did not have the staffing to further promote Kissimmee Main Street. The program went inactive in 1999.
Following notification from the National Trust for Historic Preservation Florida Main Street regarding the inactive status of Kissimmee Main Street, reorganization of the program began in 2004. Workshops were held by the CRA to educate the community about the Main Street four-point approach and to encourage participation in the program. So it was that in 2004 the Kissimmee Main Street Program, Inc. was formed and they have not slowed down since.