T-L Photo/JANELL HUNTER MARTINS FERRY business owner and Project Forward member Chuck Schorr shares ideas about promoting and improving the city at a Project Forward meeting at the Common Grounds Cafe on Thursday.

MARTINS FERRY — A group of Martins Ferry residents has formed a neighborhood revitalization organization to make the city a more attractive place to live and work, and to help promote special events to attract visitors and new businesses to the area.

Project Forward, formerly the Downtown Business Revitilization Committee, met last week at the Common Grounds cafe to brainstorm ideas to spur commerce and discuss events the group wants to promote.

The group was originally formed as a city committee by Mayor Robert Krajnyak after a fire that devastated several businesses on Fourth Street last October. Krajnyak appointed several members to the committee at that time — State Farm insurance agent Dan Stephens, Sue Douglass of the Belmont County Community Improvement Corporation, Rev. William O. Webster of Grace Presbyterian Church, Martins Ferry Chamber of Commerce President Sherry Stratton, and Martins Ferry Service Director Chris Cleary.

The group has expanded since.

“We want to promote businesses and the downtown area as a ‘destination.’ ‘Placemaking’ is a new thing, and very popular now with public planning,” Cleary said. “Placemaking is to brand and area, giving people an idea of what the place is about and a reason to visit there. Center Market in Wheeling is a good example of that.”

Cleary said the goal of the group is to get more people downtown, more patrons for businesses.

“Hopefully businesses will see positive impact from this and want to get involved,” Cleary said.

The group met to “brainstorm” ideas for the group, and to discuss events they would like to promote, including a Strawberry Festival in the spring, farmer’s markets during the summer, a Halloween or Octoberfest event in the fall, and Christmas events in December.

The group has already planned for farmer’s markets this summer, the first one to be held from 9 a.m to 1 p.m. July 1 on Fifth Street in downtown Martins Ferry. The farmer’s markets will continue until October on the first and third Saturdays of each month.

“One of our members, Melissa Yeso, got the idea to contact Ohio State University and West Virginia University extension offices to see if we could get Future Farmer’s of America and 4H kids involved in our farmer’s markets,” Cleary said. “We got a great response from the West Virginia side of the river — 60 direct vendors are interested in selling their products. We saw that there is not enough produce to go around for all the farmer’s markets around here so we thought we would do it this way. There are ongoing competitions for FFA and 4H and the kids need experience growing and selling, and this is a perfect opportunity for them, as well as for our community. We are also inviting adult vendors to come and participate. The students will be able to see how they operate and learn from them.”

The group discussed other possible events this summer, including a food truck festival and a football parade and festival.

Chuck Schorr, owner of Hot Rod Tattooing and Piercing and Project Forward member, plans to advertise and promote the city’s events and interests on social media pages. He said his shop would make and donate Project Forward T-shirts for group members to wear that will help promote their enterprise.

“Businesses that are thriving are aggressively promoting on social media now,” Schorr said. “We need to promote the most effective ways we can. We are trying to push-start a Cadillac.”

Besides promoting events that may attract visitors, the group talked about the need for the city to enforce ordinances that mandate property owners and business owners must keep their storefronts clean. The group held a community cleanup event on May 13 that coincided with the Martins Ferry Lions Club flower planiting project. Krajnyak sent a letter to business owners prior to that asking them to “do their part by cleaning their storefront and sidewalk area.” He emphasized in the letter that a clean downtown will help attract more businesses to downtown, and more customers to existing businesses.

“We have a lot in the works. It is great to have so many people involved already in Project Forward. We’re not used to having all this positive energy,” Cleary said.