Spartanburg City News

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Panthers Play 60 course to open along Rail Trail, July 25 Jul 12, 2018

Show notes

If you've found yourself on the Mary Black Foundation Rail Trail any time in the past year or so you've probably noticed a lot of work happening just past where the trail intersects with Forest Avenue. The Rail Yard, a seven-acre multi-use park fronting the trail, is starting to take shape, and the latest amenity is a first for South Carolina: the Panthers Play 60 obstacle course. The course—which is something like an NFL Scouting Combine combined with an American Ninja Warrior course—is set for a ribbon cutting on July 25 at 11 a.m., the day before Carolina Panthers Training Camp kicks off in our city. Today on the podcast, we're talking with Partners for Active Living Executive Director, Laura Ringo about the new Play 60 course, what's next for the Rail Yard, and about some planned extensions that will take the MBF Rail Trail all the way to Spartanburg's Northside. Listen below for more.

HUB-BUB Artists-in-Residence program relaunching through Chapman Cultural Center Jun 27, 2018

Show notes

If you've spent any significant amount of time in Downtown Spartanburg in the last decade, there's a pretty good chance that you've encountered work created by one of the 33 artists brought to Spartanburg through HUB-BUB's celebrated Artists-in-Residence program. Over the years, the program's artists have created lasting impacts that are both physical (like Sparkle City Mini Putt) and cultural. Now, through a merger last year with Chapman Cultural Center, the former HUB-BUB Artists-in-Residence program is back. The retooled 11-month residency is set to bring two artists to live and work in Spartanburg this September, but before that happens, we're talking with Chapman Cultural Center Creative Placemaking and HUB-BUB Director, Eric Kocher about the revived program. Listen below to learn more!

Tessa Fontaine talks 'The Electric Woman' and living in Spartanburg Jun 20, 2018

Show notes

We've interviewed a lot of people on the City Podcast. We've had business leaders, elected officials, nonprofit luminaries, artists of all kinds, and a rotating gaggle of bureaucrats so smart they could probably divide by zero if asked. What we haven't had is a local author with one of the hottest books in the country...but we've fixed that. Today on the podcast, we're talking with author and Spartanburg resident, Tessa Fontaine about her fantastic memoir The Electric Woman (glowing New York Times review here OMG!) and about her experience finding a supportive creative community in our city.

An overview of the upcoming City budget Jun 13, 2018

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Summer is here (not officially, but you know what we mean) and that means something very special for City Podcast regulars...it's time for the budget podcast. This week we've got Assistant City Manager Chris Story on to give us an overview of the most important ordinance City Council passes each year. The $40.8 million fiscal year 2018-2019 budget includes no tax or fee increases and shows four percent projected revenue growth, owing largely to growing in Hospitality Tax and Business License revenue. However, much of that growth is absorbed in the budget by necessary expenditure increases for the City's equipment replacement fund, facilities maintenance, and City Employee medical insurance and retirement fund increases. The new budget goes into effect July 1. Details include: • Three percent employee cost-of-living pay increase • Seven percent increase for the medical insurance fund • $250,834 for mandatory increases in employee retirement • Increase of $50,000 for City's legacy pension plan • $220,000 for building facilities maintenance • $1.49 million for equipment replacement Follow this link to download the full fiscal year budget.

Spartanburg Chamber's Terrance Hawes on equity, inclusiveness, and growing up on the Northside Jun 06, 2018

Show notes

Unequal access to economic opportunities. It's an ugly truth that communities around the country confront (or don't confront) every day, and Spartanburg is no different. Inclusivity, equity, and diversity—principles that many in leadership positions throughout our community value today—have long been challenges for Spartanburg. Racial and class disparities create very real barriers to economic mobility for individuals and for entire communities, and the task of removing those barriers is an enormous and necessary undertaking for all of us who want to see Spartanburg thrive. Newly hired Spartanburg Area Chamber of Commerce Talent and Economic Inclusion Coordinator, Terrance Hawes is bringing his energy and perspective to that challenge. A Northside native and success story, Hawes is the co-founder of B.A.R.S. Academy, a community-driven creative arts and music mentoring program, and in his new role will be working to create and implement the Chamber's strategic plan to ensure that economic inclusion is a Spartanburg priority and to develop, attract, and retain talent in our community. Today on the podcast, we're talking with Terrance about his new role and about the journey he's taken so far to get there.

Scrappy Shakespeare returns this summer to Downtown Spartanburg May 30, 2018

Show notes

If you ask us, Spartanburg punches far above its weight when it comes to creative talent. Sometimes that means being blown away by a local music performance at one of the dozens of venues downtown, sometimes it means hearing a reading from a local writer that you'll swear should be on the New York Times Bestseller List, and then sometimes it means seeing a performance put on by absurdly talented professional local actors who take it upon themselves to put on some extremely low-budget, high-engagement Shakespeare plays in the summer. In case that setup didn't give it away, this week's podcast is all about Scrappy Shakespeare, which returns to Downtown Spartanburg this summer for its third year, performing the crowd-pleaser to end all crowd-pleasers...Romeo and Juliet! Opening night is June 21 at Fr8Yard, but be sure to check out the Scrappy Shakespeare Facebook page to get all the details on where and when you'll be able to catch their run this summer. Today on the podcast, we're talking with Tim Giles and Anna Abhau Elliott about the show and what makes this performance of Romeo and Juliet a bit different from what you'd see on a more traditional stage.

Spartanburg Methodist College opens downtown event space May 23, 2018

Show notes

We've spent a lot of time on the City Podcast over the years chronicling Downtown Spartanburg's rise. We've covered historic redevelopments, transformative new construction projects, new City streetscaping, restaurant and retail openings, and events that cater to our diverse, newly vibrant downtown crowds. Along the way, we've also tried our best to contextualize each of these pieces of the downtown redevelopment puzzle, showing as best we can the landscape Spartanburg's people are creating in our city's core. What's the cumulative effect of all that movement? Simple: Downtown Spartanburg is now the place where local institutions, organizations, businesses, and individuals want to be. With their new space inside the newly renovated Aug W. Smith building, Spartanburg Methodist College has become latest example of such an institution, one that recognizes that the new local paradigm shift is very real and that having a presence in Downtown Spartanburg now means being in the middle of the action. Today on the podcast, we're talking with a couple of folks responsible for creating SMC's new "education, collaboration and creation space" on E Main Street, Jennifer Dillenger, Vice President for Institutional Advancement and Kris Neely, Professor of Art and Director of Interdisciplinary Studies.

Children's Museum of the Upstate opening its doors in Downtown Spartanburg May 16, 2018

Show notes

It's been one of the most highly anticipated new Downtown Spartanburg developments since its announcement last year, and starting May 19, preschool-aged children from throughout our community will have a new space to call their own as The Children's Museum of the Upstate opens their new space at 130 Magnolia Street. The new 6,000 square-foot museum features interactive exhibits geared towards children ages 5 and younger, all of which seek to inspire learning through play. All of those exhibits are exclusive to the Spartanburg museum, with some highlighting local landmarks as well as our region's plants and animals. The new museum plans to kick things off with a grand opening celebration on May 19, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m. which will include free admission to the museum and a street festival sponsored by the JM Smith Foundation. Magnolia Street will be closed from Dunbar to St. John streets for the festival, which will include entertainment, games, giveaways, and food trucks. Today on the podcast, we're talking with The Children's Museum of the Upstate President & CEO Nancy Halverson about this fantastic new addition to Downtown Spartanburg and why it's something you and your little ones won't want to miss.

Smith's Drugs to build new multi-story mixed-use building on E Main May 09, 2018

Show notes

Smith's Drugs, a fixture in Downtown Spartanburg for nearly a century, is set to see a major upgrade as plans were recently revealed to demolish the business's current one-story storefront at 142 E Main St and replace it with a new multi-story mixed-use building featuring a much larger footprint that will occupy much of the current parking lot next door and will include much more ground-floor retail (with perhaps another tenant) with residential units occupying the upper floors. Details are still being finalized on the project, which could ultimately feature an under-building drive-thru for pharmacy customers and could be between three and five stories. Today on the podcast, we're talking with City Associate Planner, Apoorva Kumar and William Gray, Associate Principal at McMillan Pazdan Smith, the developer's architecture firm, about this new development and how it fits in with recent improvements and openings along E Main Street.

Butterfly Creek Park Grand Opening to be held Saturday, May 5 May 02, 2018

Show notes

It's the culmination of a process that started back in 2012 when discussions about water quality and neighborhood redevelopment on our city's Northside led to an idea: why not resurrect an old waterway underneath the Northside neighborhood and create a park that could serve as a focal point for a reinvigorated Northside? Fast-forward through a few years of collaborative neighborhood planning, design, and enough navigating the tricky waters of federal and state government agencies to earn some of our city staff members expert-level bureaucrat merit badges and finally, the day is near. Butterfly Creek is here, ready to be enjoyed and celebrated by our residents at a grand opening ceremony to be held Saturday, May 5 at 11:30 a.m (498 Howard St.). The eight-acre park features 2,000 feet of newly daylit creek and green space, a 120-foot pedestrian bridge, as well as a quarter-mile walking path and picnic shelters. Beyond just the basics of a new parks project, the story of how this new signature amenity for Spartanburg's Northside came to be is a fascinating one, and today on the podcast, we're here to lay it all out for you. Joining us for the conversation are Community Services Director, Mitch Kennedy and Jay Squires, Streets and Stormwater Manager.

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