Brainerd Restoration Leads Crowdfunding Campaign for Downtown Brainerd

In Minnesota, there seems to be two seasons: winter and construction season. This is especially true in downtown Brainerd this summer with South Sixth Street getting entirely rebuilt, making it difficult for some commuters to get downtown.

In an effort to keep business booming this summer, Brainerd Restoration is raising money to host several events in the downtown area for a project called deTOUR Downtown.

“We’ve got this crowdfunding campaign going with MNstarter, June 1^st through the 30^th, and then the events will kickoff in July,” said Brainerd Restoration Board Member Mary Devine Johnson.

Their goal is twenty-five thousand dollars, but Brainerd Restoration has more ideas if they can raise the funds.

“We have additional opportunities identified, and funds that we’d like to raise, so if we raise more than our goal, we will apply those to some of the other initiatives we have going on,” Devine Johnson said.

Some of the events already scheduled include a belly dancing performance and class, an art act that combines music with painting, a farmers market, and a community mural that will be painted in the alley between TCAA and the Koop Building on Laurel Street.

This is not the first time business owners have seen construction in the area, and optimism is high that it will not affect business.

“In ’09 we had major construction, we re-did all of the infrastructure in the streets downtown. We had 15-foot holes dug out in front of our store,” Brainerd Mayor Ed Menk said. “We’re a destination, and if they want to come here they will figure out a way to get here.”

Brainerd Restoration understands the importance of having a great downtown and wants to continue to see Brainerd as a great spot for tourists.

“All the efforts that have been going on in the last several years for restoration and making it a destination is really important because people look for that core business district,” Devine Johnson said.

The mayor can’t stress the importance of having a great downtown enough.

“If you don’t have a good center of the city, pretty soon you become just a bedroom community, and we have too much going on in this city to just be a bedroom community,” Menk said.

Brainerd Restoration is about eighty percent of the way to their goal of $25,000. If you’d like to donate to deTOUR Downtown, visit https://app.mnstarter.com/campaign/10.