Peoria shares success story with Sterling

STERLING – Economies change, and for river cities, that brings the added challenge of transforming a riverfront.

Distilleries once fueled the Peoria economy, but today it is powered by manufacturing and health care jobs. Agriculture implement giants Caterpillar and Deere & Co. have helped pave the way to sustained growth. The city took two gut-punches in 2017 when Caterpillar announced it would move its corporate headquarters to the Chicago area, and abandon plans for a huge office project in the downtown. Easing the pain are the nearly 12,000 jobs the company has kept in Peoria.

Twenty years ago, the city’s downtown was further impacted by the flight of retail to the suburbs. Sears had fled, leaving vacant office buildings and lots in the heart of the city. In 2012, that vacuum would be filled by the Peoria Riverfront Museum – the key to the city’s riverfront transformation.

John Morris, president and CEO of the museum, and other staff executives shared Peoria’s riverfront development story last week with city leaders via a live video feed. Peoria’s efforts started in earnest 20 years ago.

“City planners decided then they would try to turn the riverfront into a recreational and entertainment area to improve the quality of life,” said Morris, who had also been involved in development while a member of the Peoria City Council.

The museum, the only private multidisciplinary institution of its kind, was chosen as the riverfront centerpiece, but at that time, few people thought it was possible. As with any huge redevelopment endeavor, there would be challenges, but many tricky pieces came together to make the project a reality.

Morris, a big believer in private sector leadership for such undertakings, said a riverfront commission was appointed by the mayor and the group stuck to its vision. As expected, there was plenty of opposition, but enough of the community eventually became believers.

“It was a combination of public and private financing – millions in private funding came in and corporate money too,” Morris said.

Jim Baldwin, a former Caterpillar executive, took on the leadership role for the commission, and he wasn’t afraid to mix it up with city officials along the way.

The answer to funding the private museum’s operations would in part come from the passage of a quarter-cent public facility sales tax that allowed the county to own the building. The timing of the request wasn’t the best.

“We were doing a public referendum in 2009, at a time when the economy was tanking,” said Kate Schureman, the museum’s chief operating officer.

State Sen. Dave Koehler, D-Peoria, had managed to amend a law to allow the sales tax to be used for any public facility or the referendum wouldn’t have been possible. It would be the last piece of legislation signed by former Gov. Rod Blagojevich before his impeachment.

The museum has five major galleries, 25 display areas, a 40-foot domed planetarium, and a 194-seat big-screen movie theater. But before designing it, a community needs assessment was done. An economic impact study was done with Bradley University.

“We visited a lot of other museums, but we built ours based on the top three needs from the assessment – to increase educational opportunities, improve quality of life, and drive economic development,” Schureman said.

Ruth Bittner, the museum’s chief financial officer, is a Peoria native who had also lived in Sterling. The transformation has been particularly gratifying for her.

“The riverfront was a place you didn’t want to go to when I left, so it’s been amazing for me to see what it has become,” Bittner said.

The project was not without environmental issues, although it wasn’t on the scale of Sterling’s cleanup challenges at Northwestern Steel & Wire, Lawrence Bros. and the Stanley building. The museum area had to be raised above the flood plain before work could begin.

Sterling Alderman Joe Martin compared the earlier development in East Peoria with what is being done along the Rock Falls riverfront.

“They didn’t have as much environmental work to do, so they are farther along in redevelopment. That can make it difficult when our residents see things happening across the river,” Martin said.

East Peoria took a completely different approach by filling in its riverfront area with several big-box retailers. The focus of each town has been complementary, bringing residents back and forth for shopping and entertainment.

“You can look at development in other cities, but don’t copy them – let Sterling be Sterling,” Morris said.

The Peoria Riverfront Museum has a $4.5 million annual operating budget and is supported by more than 4,000 members and donors.