Press Clips

Norcross wants cultural center to attract visitors to city

Gwinnett Daily Post
(Reprinted by permission from the Gwinnett Daily Post)

By Douglas Sams
Staff Writer

NORCROSS — City officials are considering a “Field of Dreams” approach to downtown commerce.
The thinking goes like this: build a cultural arts center — a place that shows movies, houses a senior center and attracts global speakers and famous storytellers such as Garrison Keillor, host of the folksy radio program “A Prairie Home Companion.”

Build this center on a city high point at College and Jones streets overlooking downtown and Buford Highway, where thousands of daily commuters can see it on their drive from suburbia to Atlanta and back.

The center acts as a magnet, drawing people to downtown restaurants, shops and housing.

“We don’t want to be an event-driven city,” said Councilman Bruce Smith. “We want this to be multipurpose, open every day of the week, a consistent creator of commerce.”

City leaders see the center’s potential, but not all agree on its details. The issues: how ambitious the project should be — including whether it should include a theater — and how much it should cost.  

Mayor Lillian Webb and City Council members are expected to discuss the project in detail at a retreat this weekend.

Initial proposals put the center’s cost at about $6.2 million, with more than half of the project funded by the Special Purpose Local Option Sales tax. Community development grants are available to build the senior citizen component of the center.

Smith also thinks corporate donations could play a big role and cites numerous examples of companies stepping up to fund construction in return for advertising rights.

Another question: Exactly where will the center be built? It appears the site will be the old Log Cabin, a Norcross landmark that sits at College and Jones Streets. It overlooks the old city field where generations of local kids have grown up playing baseball on warm summer nights.

However, some council members have suggested other sites might be better, including the church adjacent to the ball field.

Like most cities in the sprawling suburbs, Norcross businesses compete with strip malls, movie theaters and big box stores spread across unincorporated Gwinnett.

In the 1980s, the city reinvigorated its downtown with new streetscapes and businesses. In the past two years, the city has worked with developers such as Robert Forro and Hedgewood Properties to bring more upscale housing to downtown.