LEXINGTON, KY - The city has been setting the table downtown with a new streetscape plan, but the planned centerpiece, the glass and steel pavilion in Cheapside Park, was looking like it would not adorn its space. That was before Fifth Third Bank and the Downtown Lexington Corporation struck a $750,000 deal, which was announced last week.
"We learned that there was not money for the pavilion around the end of August, early September," said DLC president Renee Jackson. "The plan at that point was just to go ahead and do all the other improvements (to Cheapside Park) and then hopefully secure funding for that pavilion at a later time."
That's when Jackson's vice president of development Jessica Gies met with Fifth Third vice president and CFO Keith Dershem, whom she got to know in last year's Leadership Lexington class through Commerce Lexington. "I look at this as a direct result of those relationships that formed in that program," Jackson said.
"We were talking with the DLC about how we might participate in the downtown streetscape plan and that inspired the discussion about the pavilion," Fifth Third President Sam Barnes said after announcing the $750,000 gift to the Downtown Lexington Corporation Foundation.
"I prefer not to have to think about (what would have happened if Fifth Third didn't make this gift), too very much," Mayor Jim Newberry said about when, if ever, the pavilion - now called the Fifth Third Pavilion - would have been constructed. Preliminary plans for a pavilion at that location were originally announced in February. "Certainly the fact that Fifth Third stepped up and made this contribution made the funding of this pavilion much, much easier.
"We have been exploring several different funding options, private funding options, and I had not given up hope that somebody was going to step up and seize the opportunity," Newberry added.
At the February press conference in Cheapside Park, Newberry announced the incremental update to the park, which included removing old semi-functional fountains and installing a concrete and brick pad for the 2009 seasons of the Farmer's Market and DLC's Thursday Night Live. At the time he said the work on the park and much of the streetscape would be funded with stimulus money and tax increments from a downtown TIF. The TIF, planned as a part of the yet-to-be-built CentrePointe project, has yet to be approved by the state and has not produced any increments. While LFUCG awaits American Recovery Act funding, according to Newberry, the rest of the $18 million streetscape plan is being funded with other transportation and infrastructure dollars.
The plan for the months ahead for Cheapside Park has been to rework the park by leveling the grade and moving the statue of former Vice President John Cabell Breckinridge to the front of the park facing Main Street. Without funding, the glass and steel pavilion would have lived only in drawings.
"I loved the plans and design that was coming out. I thought they were very positive for downtown," Barnes said. "We feel that the downtown area is the heart of our community. You have to have a vibrant downtownÖ We've got a lot of momentum going now, and when you look at what that pavilion will be to enhance events that can be down here and the farmers market and that sort of thing, I think it'll bring in more interest into the downtown area. If downtown is strong, that helps make the community stronger, and that's good for the bank."
DLC's Gies and Fifth Third's Dershem met on September 10 to start talking in earnest about funding the pavilion, Jackson said, to "figure out what the benefit to Fifth Third would be. I think the benefit to downtown is clear. Within two weeks, Mr. Barnes was able to come back with a firm 'yes.'"
The gift to the DLC Foundation was by far its largest ever, and with approval by the parks board and Urban County Council, it will be turned over to LFUCG to construct the Fifth Third Pavilion.
"That's what the DLC Foundation is for," Jackson said. "It is to go out and seek this type of project for downtown."
Fifth Third will have its name on four entry points to the pavilion for 15 years and be able to use it rent-free five times a year, Jackson said. Barnes said he plans to use the space to bring the company's branch employees together downtown from time to time and to allow some of the groups Fifth Third supports and works with a space for events or fundraising.