TULSA, Okla. — Inside the Pearl District, neighbors are dreaming, and 2 News is listening.
For all its history and charm, the district could use a boost.
“We’re very pro-development. We want … we want people here,” Tye Silverthorne, President of the Pearl District Association, said.
WATCH: PEARL DISTRICT: Leaders, neighbors talk new horizons, reinvestments
Silverthorne and the rest of the PDA have big dreams for their neck of Tulsa.
“Pedestrian friendly neighborhoods, and areas all around. We want to have places where it’s bikable, where you can sit out on a street corner, and have a beer or you can eat at a restaurant,” Silverthorne said, “We wanna have trees. The kind of investment that creates a long term community; because that’s ultimately our end goal, is to create, and rebuild a community here that was lost through urban renewal and things like that.”
Despite their big ambitions, neighbors say they feel unheard. City leaders, they say, have left them out of decision-making.
“Sometimes someone can just walk in and they can have power that some people sitting in a community group on a board don’t have,” Silverthorne said.
During the July 8 meeting of the PDA, 2 News sat alongside the neighbors and listened as Councilor Vanessa Hall-Harper and other city leaders addressed the association.
The meeting centered around the prospects of a Tax Increment Finance (TIF) district. If approved by the city council, work would begin on a new development, possibly with some kickbacks from the city.
An apartment complex, a hotel, or new shops could potentially be used as the ‘catalyst’ project for the TIF. The new property taxes, created from the development, would be reinvested into the area.
WHAT'S A TIF? CLICK HERE. >>> The City of Batavia, IL published a helpful guide, explaining the TIF process
Reinvestment, by any means, would take years. No matter what, Silverthorne hopes the neighbors are heard.
“Even though we’ve been around for 25 years, and we’ve been meeting regularly, and we have dreams and aspirations for our own neighborhood, sometimes, money just speaks a little bit louder,” Silverthorne said, “Going forth, it’s just better for everybody when everybody has a stake in the neighborho0d in which they live and work.”
Maybe the July 8 meeting was a turning point.
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