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Murray Community Members Discuss How to Rebuild Downtown at Town Hall Meeting

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Murray leaders and residents are forming a vision for downtown after a series of disasters destroyed several buildings this year.

Murray Main Street Director Deana Wright held one of three town hall meetings this morning to get the community’s input on what they want to see downtown after a fire and buildingcollapses.

“I did hear arts being a major push and going after funding and really bringing the whole community together to make this the downtown we want it to be,” she said.

Around 80 residents at the meeting showed support for more arts and retail while others were concerned with tax incentives and private investment opportunities. Among those was Mayor-elect Jack Rose.

“One of the things I plan to do early on is to ask the property owners to come together and let’s talk about what their vision is, what they’re willing to do or not do with their property,” he said. “It is their property so if we do not have their buy in than anything else we might look at or work on might be totally invalid.”

After the town hall Jack Rose said development has been “piecemeal” in the past and that this meeting is the first of several to get the community’s opinion before Murray Main Street works to create a formal plan.

The next two meetings will be in the coming year.

Whitney grew up listening to Car Talk to and from her family’s beach vacation each year, but it wasn’t until a friend introduced her to This American Life that radio really grabbed her attention. She is a recent graduate from Union University in Jackson, Tenn., where she studied journalism. When she’s not at WKMS, you can find her working on her backyard compost pile and garden, getting lost on her bicycle or crocheting one massive blanket.
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