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Grants awarded to Grand Haven, Grosse Pointe, Lansing, Lapeer, Niles, Otsego, Saline and Sault Ste Marie

LANSING, Mich. – Governor Whitmer and the Michigan Economic Development Corporation (MEDC) have announced that eight communities around Michigan have been awarded a total of $160,000 in grants to support downtown enhancement and improvement projects.

Governor Whitmer is committed to supporting small businesses as Michigan continues growing its economy. Michigan has added jobs for 10 straight months, including adding 172,000 jobs year over year, and has a low unemployment rate of 4.7% that has declined 10 months in a row.

“Vibrant downtown areas are critical to creating jobs, attracting new investments, and helping local businesses

We all needed a little glitz this year to cheer us up. The burden of the pandemic on our downtown brick and mortar businesses weighed heavily, and at Saline Main Street it all but killed us to see our wonderful community struggle so much. When things are rough, but you have to keep going? It can be hard as hell.

So we wanted to lighten things up a little. Enter local artist and our partner in light crimes, Gary Parker Nola.

Last winter, we were awarded an Art

When I first arrived in Saline to take the helm as executive director at Saline Main Street, I thought how great it would be to have a mixed media arts space in the heart of downtown — something similar to Amazing Things Arts Center (ATAC) in my hometown of Framingham, Mass. I saw how instrumental ATAC was in attracting visitors and patrons to its small business neighbors, and believed that an arts and culture community space like that would benefit the small businesses in Downtown Saline.

That arts space vision included a gallery — open to artists