Jefferson’s Speggen, urban expert Katz examine ‘Future of Main Street Businesses amidst the COVID-19 Crisis’
Erie’s economic challenges amid the coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic and how they reflect what many cities across the nation are now facing is the focus of a newly released essay by Jefferson Educational Society Vice President Ben Speggen and urban planning expert Bruce Katz.
“As federal emergency responses move to ground … do these measures work for thousands of downtowns and main streets like Erie,” question Speggen and Katz in the essay titled “Why Erie’s Downtown is a Proxy for the Nation.”
The Speggen-Katz essay was produced through the collaboration of Drexel University’s Nowak Metro Finance Lab and Accelerator for America, and the Jefferson Educational Society. It was first released late Tuesday by Drexel (https://drexel.edu/nowak-lab/publications/reports/ErieMainStreetBusinessCrisis/ ) and can be accessed now on the Jefferson’s website, www.JESErie.org.
“We believe stories like Erie’s and other local responses telegraph our path to recovery,” Speggen and Katz write. “On one level, a fast recovery in the long term (when the health crisis abates) is dependent on the nature and scale of the short-term response. The longer we can keep small businesses alive and workers employed, the quicker the recovery and rebound will be. Erie is a microcosm of the small cities throughout the country. If we can keep businesses alive, then the bounce back will be rapid and pronounced. If businesses collapse, then the recovery will be slow and painful.”
It concludes with a sobering assessment: “Unfortunately, as Erie demonstrates, the crisis has already moved past stabilizing solutions: many small business owners have already laid off almost all their employees and are wary of taking on excessive debt given the uncertainty.”
“We are all in unprecedented times and circumstances,” Speggen said. “That includes Main Street America businesses. “What has taken years to build in places like Erie could be wiped away in weeks – if appropriate action is not taken. What will that take? That’s what Katz and I contend with this report.”
