BY VINAYA SAKSENA

CENTRAL FALLS — The Florida college student spearheading an effort to revitalize the Broad Street corridor toured the area with local students Thursday, encouraging them to get involved locally and support all things local.

The students, who were participants in the Blackstone Valley Academy’s SPIRIT Program, were studying the concept of “downtown” areas by experiencing them firsthand and interviewing people who live and work there. The plan is for their writings to eventually be published in book form, according to information provided by the Blackstone Valley Tourism Council, the group that has been leading efforts to economically revitalize the neighborhood.
Thursday’s tour was led by Alex Sommer, the University of Florida student who has been serving as the tourism council’s Broad Street Initiative Coordinator. As the group progressed through the area on foot, Sommer talked to the students about the way the area once was and the way it is now, including the effect of outsourcing a once-vibrant manufacturing economy.
“Hasbro has kind of decreased since all the jobs went overseas,” Sommer said of a well-known toy manufacturer with local ties. “There’s nothing wrong with that, but that has left a problem called unemployment…. You have to plan for the future, and that’s what we’re doing now.”
Sommer pointed out that a recent attempt to revitalize the area through renovation of old mill buildings appeared to have hit a wall. He cited the mortgage crisis currently faced by the United States as a whole as a reason for this problem.
Sommer said that in order for a neighborhood to remain vital and sustainable, it had to remain affordable for its residents. For this reason, he suggested keeping gentrification of communities under control by introducing rent caps, which he said would keep residents from being priced out of their neighborhood.
SPIRIT students said they were interested in Sommer’s ideas and wanted contribute some of their own because of a concern for the quality of life in the area.
They said the area needed sources of things to do- both for adults trying to make a living and kids trying to stay out of trouble.
While addressing the students, Sommer encouraged them to question why certain developments were taking place if they felt these developments were not good for the community, citing proposed Auto Zone and Taco Bell locations along Broad Street as specific examples.
“I don’t think they should have put Auto Zone in,” said student and Central Falls resident Tiffany Alvarez, citing the existence of similar businesses nearby. “I don’t think they really need it.”
“People want more local stuff instead of big (chain) stuff,” said fellow student Guadalupe Ortiz, a former Central Falls resident currently living in Providence. “Maybe it could become a little more Federal Hill in Providence.”
Sommer encouraged the students to become involved in their communities, pointing out that in a state as small as Rhode Island, state officials may prove more accessible and willing to listen to individual residents than elsewhere. He also encouraged them to attend city council meetings, ask questions, and make their concerns and opinions known, in order to ensure that their community remained healthy and vibrant. Bruce Reis, a student from Pawtucket, appeared ready to do this, and had his hopes for the area set high.
“I’d like to see more people take pride in this city,” Reis said. “I’d like to see our city become one of the major places that people travel to from California and places like that, instead of people traveling to California.”