Dickson Street Unites to Endorse Lights, WAC Expansions

Business owners on Fayetteville’s most recognizable strip have made attempts throughout the years to come together and form a collective voice for the restaurants, bars, stores, churches, etc. found along Dickson Street.

Each of the previous endeavors fizzled before anything was accomplished, but this summer the group formally organized the Dickson Street Merchants Association.

This time, it’s legit. The association is incorporated, there are membership dues, and at the end of the year there are going to be official stickers, said Bill Waite, owner of Dickson Street Liquor and secretary of the association.

“There’s a lot of momentum behind it right now,” Waite said.

The driving force? Initially, it was support of extending the Lights of the Ozarks holiday display from the town square down Block Street and along Dickson.

That is officially happening when the lights go on Nov. 23. City Council voted in August to fund the $56,500 venture.

Displays on Dickson will include streetlights wrapped in lighted garland and hanging light fixtures in the form of snowflakes, poinsettias and Razorbacks purchased from Get Lit LLC of Springdale.

Members of the merchant group hope the additions will divert some attention from the bustling downtown square — which sees thousands of visitors each holiday season — to the Dickson strip, providing an economic surge to the bars and restaurants in the area during what is typically a slow time of year.

Since the business owners have been able to hang up the Lights of the Ozarks initiative, they are now focused on the other major motivator of forming their group: the backing of ballot measures they say will contribute to the local economy. 

Fayetteville residents will vote on the ballot items, which are favored unanimously by the Dickson merchants, in a Nov. 12 special election.

If the measures pass, the city will issue bonds to repay debt accrued from building the Fayetteville Town Center, to build a regional ballpark off Cato Springs Road and to help renovate the Walton Arts Center. All of this would be paid for through an existing hotel, motel and restaurant tax.

Primarily, the group is interested in putting $6.9 million toward the $20 million expansion of the Walton Arts Center, which has not been updated since it was built in 1992.

“It’s time to do it,” said Waite, who also serves on the arts center board of directors.

Besides updating the facility and adding 30,000 SF, the renovation would include a design that better integrates the venue with the rest of the strip, Waite said.

Dickson merchants say the Walton Arts Center could then attract and accommodate bigger productions, and the economic benefits would spill over to the rest of the businesses in the area.

In addition, the revenue from construction would stimulate the local economy as a whole.

The expansion would provide a “needed economic uplift to the downtown area,” Joe Fennel, owner of Bordinos and president of the association, said in a news release.

Carl Collier, owner of Collier Drug Stores, serves as treasurer for the association, which now boasts a membership of a couple dozen — a number the merchants hope to grow.

Monthly meetings are open to anyone interested in the future of Dickson, Waite said. “We want people to bring their friends and neighbors.”

Fayetteville Mayor Lioneld Jordan and Steve Clark, president and CEO of the Fayetteville Chamber of Commerce, have attended meetings, which Waite says have yielded a cache of big ideas for various special events.

The main goal of the association is to protect the identity of what Waite calls the “crown jewel of Fayetteville.”

As business owners, “we realize what’s good for Dickson Street is good for us,” he said.

And with Dickson as a powerful economic driver for the city, what’s good for it is likely good for Fayetteville.