For The State Journal

Downtown Fairmont is a semifinalist for a national award for the second year in a row.

Main Street Fairmont’s entry last year landed Downtown Fairmont among the top 10 applicants for the Great American Main Street Awards. When it wasn’t chosen as one of the five best in the country, The National Trust Main Street Center — which hands out the award — encouraged MSF to try again this year, Executive Director Vera Sansalone said.

Last year, Downtown Fairmont was up against Rehoboth Beach, Del., and Baltimore’s Federal Hill in the highly competitive contest.

“We filled out an online application that asked questions relating to our growth and prosperity as a downtown district,” said Vista volunteer Sandra Scaffidi. “Main Street is a volunteer-based organization that uses a four-point approach, which balances economic development with downtown beautification, organization and the promotion of downtown.”

Making the top 10 again this year, Downtown Fairmont has cleared only the first hurdle.

Main Street Fairmont has to submit a book of evidence highlighting the program’s accomplishments to be judged by former award winners, community development professionals, representatives from government and foundations and journalists who are active in community economic development and historic preservation.

Five winners are selected from the 10 semifinalists and will be announced in May.

Sansalone said the application includes things the organization has done during the past year to better the program, such as a marketing and branding study that a consultant completed.

“One of the things that came out of that study is that we have to market this downtown as a destination in north-central West Virginia,” Sansalone said. “We have a new logo. We’re going to do some new way-finding signage. With the Gateway Connector, we came up with Fairmont getting a new front door as opposed to using the side door and back door through South Fairmont and East Fairmont exits (off Interstate 79).”

A $20,000 matching grant from Preserve America will pay for a high-tech walking tour.

“We’re taking the oral histories of older Fairmonters and what they remember about downtown and creating small thematic podcasts that people can download from our Web site to their iPods and watch as they walk downtown,” Sansalone said.

She gave some examples of stops on the tour.

“Hagans Ice Cream was really big in downtown Fairmont, so when you talk to people they have fond memories,” she said.

Many people mentioned a good-looking man who worked behind ice cream counter. So staffers found out who he was and tracked down his family members for the podcast.

They also talked to the people who worked at the Palace Restaurant, famous locally for its pecan roll and fruit bowl. And they talked to a cab driver who would drop off fares on Water Street, which was the city’s red-light district. He remembered the “Palatine Ladies” hanging out the windows of buildings, calling to customers.

“We did it to showcase and highlight older Fairmont to people,” Sansalone said.

That and the branding campaign “we think will position us really well for this award.”

If Fairmont wins the Great American Main Street Award, it will join Morgantown as the only other city in the state to earn the designation. Main Street Morgantown won for its downtown in 1998.

MSM Executive Director Terri Cutright told Sansalone that persistence pays off.

Main Street Morgantown applied and was a semifinalist twice before winning the award for its downtown on its third try. Cutright said the honor is a lifetime award.

“We are very supportive of Fairmont winning that award,” she said. “To have two GAMSA award winners within 15 miles of each other is really something special.”

The other nine 2010 Great American Main Street Awards semifinalists are:

• Downtown Aledo, Ill.;
• Main Street Columbus, Miss.;
• Farmland (Ind.) Downtown Historic District;
• Downtown Ferndale, Mich.;
• Downtown Fort Pierce, Fla.;
• Downtown Lee’s Summit, Mo.;
• Historic Downtown and LowerTown Arts District, Paducah, Ky.;
• Pontiac (Ill.) P.R.O.U.D.;
• and Downtown Rochester, Mich.

The winners will be announced May 4 during the National Main Streets Conference in Oklahoma City.

The 2010 Great American Main Street Awards are sponsored by natural gas producer Chesapeake Energy.