CBID moves forward with downtown Fort Smith projects

The Fort Smith Central Business Improvement District (CBID) Board voted Thursday (Feb. 20) to contribute $77,000 to the Garrison Courtyard project in hopes a project using assessment dollars will be completed before summer.

Joshua Robertson, director of Citizens Services, Sustainability, Fleet and Facilities for the City of Fort Smith, approached the CBID board in July about helping with a city greenspace at 716 Garrison Ave. He suggested the commissioners look at the project that would increase sidewalk width, add light poles and string lights, and add a parking garage pedestrian entrance.

Robertson told commissioners the city has made improvements to the property adjacent to Italian restaurant Prima Italia. They have installed lighting in the area between the restaurant and the city’s parking garage and made irrigation possible. He said the city has halted their work in case CBID wants to take on the project. The city plans to put in irrigation and a garden on the city-owned property. But the CBID would need to finance widening the sidewalks, adding seating if wanted, and adding string lights, Robertson told commissioners at the time.

Robertson updated the board on the project Thursday, noting the city has paid for the design of the project. The city is paying $15,615 of the project’s total $84,219 cost, leaving $77,083 for the CBID’s contribution, which commissioners unanimously approved. The total cost of the courtyard project is $84,219.

With the vote, the city can bid out the project and hopefully have it completed in time for the Steel Horse Rally in May, Robertson said.

“It’s not a huge project,” Robertson said.

The new park will include five park benches and string lights, which will make it an inviting corridor between the city’s parking garage and Garrison Avenue, Robertson has noted in the past.

The CBID is using $44,000 of assessment dollars to offset the city’s net cost of canceling a landscape contract for downtown and bringing that function in-house with a full-time crew dedicated to downtown. This will “take the place of” previous discussions for “clean and green” use of the assessment dollars, said Interim City Administrator Jeff Dingman.

“There will be other expenses associated with materials, plants, irrigation maintenance and such where CBID participation is justified (with the downtown maintenance), and they have budgeted some dollars for that in their 2025 numbers,” Dingman said.

The money the CBID will contribute to the Garrison Courtyard project uses more of the approximate $150,000 assessment dollars earmarked for “green and clean” when it was originally pitched.

“When the concept of the parks in-house crew shifted and didn’t need all of that (estimated) $110,000 originally contemplated, the CBID chose to start using some of those dollars for the projects identified in the strategic plan of improvement they commissioned from MAHG Architects,” Dingman said.

MAHG Architecture presented a blueprint for a better downtown in April 2024, explaining 10 projects that could ease mobility downtown while making the area more attractive to residents and visitors. The projects range in price from about $9,000 to $1.6 million, with the total combined cost for all the projects estimated to be $3.2 million.

After the plan was presented, commissioners decided to take on two projects with a combined cost of $74,500 — the Garrison Crossing at Third Street project with a price tag of $9,208.31, and the Art Walk Connector with a cost of $65,362.36. The Art Walk Connector will have an entry plaza, art pedestals, string lights and an art walk lighted sign. It will be by the state office building and Prohibition Bar. The art could be rotated at certain intervals.

Main Street Fort Smith — formerly 64.6 Downtown — is working on an alleyway installation between buildings for the Art Walk, so the string lighting part of the project will be funded through them. That will reduce the CBID cost. Main Street Fort Smith is also installing $9,500 in lights and two transformers for the lighting part of the Art Walk Corridor.

The CBID contributed a $10,000 match for the local public art grant that will allow a sidewalk mural between the state office building and 702 Garrison for that project.

Commissioners learned in July that the Third Street crossing project could not happen because a “pedestrian scramble” large crosswalk that allows for basic across-the-street crossings as well as diagonal crossings was not approved by the Arkansas Department of Transportation.

“Finally we’ve got one that can be started,” Commissioner Phil White said at Tuesday’s meeting.

The CBID, a semiautonomous governing body, agreed to levy a supplemental annual assessment of up to 10 mils on real property within CBID boundaries — primarily in downtown Fort Smith almost four years ago. The Fort Smith Board of Directors in 2022 approved an assessment on properties in the CBID. The assessment funds, roughly $220,000 received in October 2023 and roughly the same in October 2024, were earmarked to support a downtown safety and security program, and a “green and clean” project.