Event to celebrate development, engagement in northeast OKC
In a city that has reinvented itself over the past few decades, northeast Oklahoma City is searching for its own renaissance.
“We want to show the rest of Oklahoma City that there is a new northeast side coming and you’re invited,” said Quintin Hughes about oNE OKC, a free community event planned for Saturday. “The goal here is to showcase and honor the past, present and future of northeast Oklahoma City. We want to make sure people have the chance to be informed about what is happening and have an opportunity to be involved in it.
“But we also want to attract the broader city and really kind of announce the northeast is a future destination and is a place we see as an economically and socially vibrant community.”
Remaking itself
Divided from the city’s core by a highway, littered with empty lots left over from failed urban renewal efforts and plagued by high concentrations of poverty, northeast Oklahoma City is a predominantly black community that has struggled to participate in the economic development growth seen in other urban communities.
But Hughes, who is co-chair of the Northeast Renaissance Steering Committee, believes his part of town has a chance to remake itself through economic development and neighborhood renewal projects currently in the works.
Saturday’s event will be held at the stadium at Douglass High School and include food trucks, musicians, vendors and all the common sights of the type of community events often held in the city’s downtown and Midtown neighborhoods.
And while the event aims to entertain, there is also a goal to tap the community into the current redevelopment effort underway by the city.
“It’s an uphill battle against the past and the perception of urban renewal,” said Michael Owens, community development director for The Alliance for Economic Development of Oklahoma City.
Earlier efforts
Urban renewal efforts in the 1960s took advantage of federal funding to clear blighted homes and structures in northeast Oklahoma City. But much of the new development failed to materialize. Today, Owens said The Alliance, which oversees hundreds of lots in the northeast corner of the city, is leading councilapproved tax incentive programs to entice developers to come to the community.
A $7 million redevelopment of the Northeast Town Center at NE 36 and N Lottie Avenue is underway that will bring a new grocery store to the community. A tax incentive district created along NE 23 also seeks to increase local retail offerings.
At Saturday’s event, Hughes said a “building tomorrow tent” will give visitors a chance to see proposed developments and offer their own ideas.
“We will have an area where developers will show their models of developments and they will be there to answer questions about those developments,” Hughes said. “We will also have a big Lego table where families are encouraged to come together and build what they want to see in the community.”
Hughes said artist Skip Hill will also be creating a mural during the event with opportunities for visitors to participate.
“I see this as a kickoff of what is in store for northeast Oklahoma City,” said city Councilman John Pettis, who represents the northeast.
Pettis said he views the current redevelopment efforts, including a strong community engagement, as the piece that was missing in previous attempts.
“We have to realize that urban renewal of yesterday, which some would describe as urban removal, is not what is taking place today,” Pettis said. “We are now using urban renewal to bring about economic development for those who currently live in the area and I’m excited to showcase it on Saturday.”