Winchester’s downtown was recently recognized by the Main Street program as the first in Virginia to reach $100 million in private investments. The watershed project, as cited by Karen Helm, executive director for the Old Town Development Board, was the Feltner Building at 9 Court Square in the mid-1990s.
Though less than $12 million total (without adjustments for inflation) had been invested downtown in the previous decade, then-President Wilbur M. Feltner got the bank to invest $2.5 million to renovate the building.
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“After a successful completed project,” Helm said, “there’s more of a sense of security that if somebody comes and makes an investment down here, they’ll get a return on their investment. I don’t think anybody likes to be the first to have confidence in an aging downtown, but Mr. Feltner did.”
Read the full article by Vic Bradshaw in the Winchester Star here (login required).
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