Santa Ana Seeks to Restore Luster to Main Street

Main Street, a nostalgic symbol of every city’s downtown, is looking worn in Santa Ana. But officials hope that plans to revive the road that splits the city will provide a boost to business owners in the area.

The problem with the stretch of road between 1st Street and Warner Avenue is that it does not look like a Main Street should, said Benjamin Mendoza, owner of Kelly’s Body Shop on South Main.

“It’s Main Street in name only. It doesn’t look like Main Street,” he said. “The city has neglected the street and sidewalks, without thinking about people from other cities who drive through here every day to get to the Civic Center,” a complex of county, state and federal offices. “They don’t have much incentive to stop and spend.”

Mendoza, who emigrated from Colima, Mexico, almost 30 years ago, helped organize the South Santa Ana Merchants Assn. in 1999 to work with city officials to improve the street and the businesses that line it. Like Mendoza, many business owners on South Main are immigrants. Thanks to the association, they feel a new sense of power in their dealings with the city.

“The city is talking with us, not dictating to us like before,” said Mendoza, who bought his shop in 1993. “We’ve learned a lot about how politics works in this country in the process.”

Mendoza and the others learned that it is easier for a group to take on City Hall. Officials took notice of the merchants association, and in 1999 the city began crafting a limited redevelopment plan for Main Street. Some of those improvements are just beginning.

The group found allies in council members Jose Solorio, who represents the area, and Lisa Bist, who grew up in Santa Ana and lives three blocks from Main Street. One of Bist’s top priorities when elected in 1998 was revitalizing the street.

“South Main is important because it’s part of our historic shopping district. When you say Main and 1st, it should mean something to people. Right now it doesn’t mean anything, because the city has ignored it for years,” she said.

Bist and Solorio are the only members of a special Main Street subcommittee formed by the City Council. The subcommittee is working with Mendoza’s group to formulate a beautification plan. Together with the city’s Community Development Agency, they developed a modest proposal to repair the street, lay new sidewalks and improve the storefront facades by using a combination of new color schemes, landscaping, signage and lighting.

“We’re limited in what we can do. The buildings come right up to the sidewalk, so widening the street or doing anything else to it is impossible,” Bist said.

The city launched the beautification plans with a “model block” program, beginning with stores on the east side of the 800 block of South Main Street, including Main Street Photo, which opened in 1933. Once renovated with new facades, these stores will serve as a model for the rest of the street.

“It’s going to be a two- or three-year program, and business owners like Benjamin are involved every step of the way,” Bist said. “They’re on South Main and know the reality of the area. These people know what improvements will make this plan work.”

Mendoza knows what will work for his shop. Last week, the city Planning Department approved his plans to put a new facade on his buildings and landscape the front. He estimates that the construction costs will run him about $35,000.

“I’m from Mexico, but I know how important Main Street is to an American city. Other merchants are waiting to see how my plans work out before they do the same thing. Pretty soon this will look like a real Main Street,” he said.

To encourage business owners to remodel their stores, Santa Ana is offering a rebate program to offset construction costs, Bist said. In addition, the city hired an architect to look at the stores in the 800 block of South Main and come up with ideas to improve the fronts.

The architect will propose facade improvements and the use of color and lighting. The city also is looking at several geometric patterns and colors for the new sidewalks.

Solorio said the goal is “to showcase Main Street as a unique district.” He credited new Latino business owners and non-Latinos who have had stores on Main Street for years for lobbying to bring improvements to the area.

“These folks saw the improvements we made on Bristol Street and Harbor Boulevard,” Solorio said of the two major north-south arteries running through the city, “and demanded that the city pay attention to Main Street.”

“Latino business owners are helping to rejuvenate Main Street. As new immigrants, they bring a wealth of energy and passion for building a small business from scratch,” he said.

Mendoza estimated that about 70 business owners make up the merchants association. It took just one meeting for everyone to realize that all of them--Latinos and non-Latinos--shared the same concern about modernizing their stores’ appearance to attract more customers.

“That was everyone’s priority. Many of our customers are Latinos, but people from all over the county drive up and down this street every day. We also want them to be our customers,” Mendoza said.

Bist said the aging appearance of many of commercial buildings drive some customers away.

“The buildings are old, and the mentality in Orange County is that if it’s old, it’s a scary place to shop,” she said.

“But there are a lot of great services on Main Street. It’s a matter of changing people’s perception. If we can spruce up the area and define it as a commercial district, people will stop and shop.”

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Remaking Main

South Main Street in Santa Ana will be repaired and the landscaping and facades of its businesses remodeled under an improvement plan developed by a merchants group and the city.