This Santa Ana Street Is Back on the Map

Five years ago, it would have been hard for John White to imagine pedestrians strolling down Santa Ana’s South Main Street under a canopy of palm trees.

During most of his 31 years running a Mobil service station, the commercial strip was pocked with empty storefronts and decaying facades and menaced by crime. City officials were more worried about reviving the ailing downtown, White said. And the Chamber of Commerce focused more on businesses with 500 or more employees than small operations like his, he said.

But when a light-rail project was proposed to run down their side of Main Street, which would wipe out their businesses, White and three other businessmen decided it was time to change the perception of South Main Street.

“We wanted this street to look like a main street worthy of its name,” said Benjamin Mendoza, one of the three, and owner of Kelly’s Body Shop.

The three connected with city officials, with the Chamber of Commerce and with other small-business owners. They started in 1998 and called themselves the South Santa Ana Merchants Assn. White has led the group for most of its existence. Lobbying by the association led to the city directing more than $7.2 million in local and federal money to South Main Street improvements. The light-rail project was moved to Bristol Street.

Today, South Main Street is filled with pedestrians and has 500 more jobs than it did five years ago. Business locations have a 1% vacancy rate.

The overhaul, which is still occurring toward the south end of the project area, was begun with a handful of municipal and private projects, including new curbs, sidewalks, landscaping and parking. The first set of improvements runs from 1st Street to Edinger Avenue. Yet to be completed is the stretch from Edinger Avenue to Sunflower Avenue.

Among the self-help projects: business owners lobbied the city and its redevelopment agency to offer a facade-improvement program in which business owners were reimbursed 75% of the cost of buying new signs and improving their buildings’ exteriors.

John Reekstin, Community Development Agency executive director, said that in the last two years, 10 businesses on South Main Street received rebates between $10,000 and $25,000 for improvements, and two will receive rebates soon.

“If you drive down South Main Street now versus two years ago, you can really see the improvement,” he said.

Mendoza completed a $43,000 improvement project at his business, using only $17,000 of his money for two new signs and an entranceway.

“We definitely see more people in the business and on the street,” Mendoza said.

David Jasso, owner of American Eagle Auto Repair, improved his parking lot, installed planters and ordered a new sign, paying little more than half of the $25,000 price.

“The building looks better. The street looks better. The program has really worked,” Jasso said.

Code enforcement officers, meanwhile, cracked down on illegal property uses, including illegal signs and expansion.

In the next phase, overhead utility lines will be removed between Warner and Sunflower avenues. More street improvements, including pouring colored sidewalks and repairing damaged curbs, are also planned, starting in April.

The street’s 275-member business association is planning a two-mile Christmas parade and has become active in the Chamber of Commerce.

“Since the 1970s, this is the best I’ve ever seen [South Main Street],” said White. “To see people walking here means a lot. There was a time when people would have been too scared to do that here.”

And the success formula is being shared with other Santa Ana neighborhoods. Jasso, White and others are meeting with business owners, discussing what lessons they learned in improving the street, including how to create a unified front in lobbying for city, state and federal funds to pay for the work.

“We are never going to fight each other,” White said. “We learned we need to work together. And we learned that you really can’t fight City Hall. You have to join in the process so that the community sees the benefit.”