Congratulations to St Cloud Main Street for recently being designated as an accredited Main Street™ program. Each year, Main Street America and its partners announce the list of accredited programs to recognize for their exceptional commitment to preservation-based economic development and community revitalization through the Main Street Approach™.

“We are proud to recognize this year’s 889 nationally accredited Main Street programs that have worked tirelessly to advance economic vitality and quality of life in their downtowns and commercial districts,” said Patrice Frey, President & CEO of Main Street America. “During an incredibly challenging year, these programs demonstrated the power of the Main Street movement to drive impressive local recovery efforts, champion small businesses, and foster vibrant downtown districts. I am inspired by their hard work and confident that these accredited communities will continue to help their downtowns flourish in the next stages of recovery.”

In 2020, Main Street America programs generated $4.14 billion in local reinvestment, helped open 4,356 net new businesses, generated 14,988 net new jobs, catalyzed the rehabilitation of 8,488 historic buildings, and clocked 983,702 volunteer hours.

The St. Cloud Main Street’s performance is annually evaluated by Florida State Main Street which works in partnership with Main Street America to identify the local programs that meet 10 national performance standards. Evaluation criteria determines the communities that are building meaningful and sustainable revitalization programs and include standards such as, fostering strong public-private partnerships, documenting programmatic progress, and actively preserving historic buildings.

This year’s additional accomplishments were assisting downtown businesses during the covid shut down, a reopening of downtown with 2020 Rewind event, creating a historic documentary promoting the recent installation of two historic markers- Mt. Peace Cemetery & Fisk Funeral Home, Designation of the Veterans Memorial Library and Woman’s Club on the National Register and a new historic mural –”Coble’s Garage” on Handyman Hardware’s building and completing the historic building inventory report.