The African American Legacy Project of Northwest Ohio announced that it is in conversation with the Toledo Public Schools and the Toledo Museum of Art toward creating a K-8 School of the Arts and a Cultural Performing Arts Center.
“We're doing due diligence right now,” said Robert Smith, founder and president of the African American Legacy Project. “We're doing the program requirements, talking to architects for renderings of what it might look like.”
The vision for the school and cultural center is on par with other state-of-the-art centers fostering rich, diverse cultural experiences through the arts.
“The African American Legacy Project envisions a cultural center designed to meet the cultural and social needs of the community while serving as a stimulant to drive economic growth and community development,” the organization said in a statement.
While the concept is only in the talking phase, Mr. Smith and the project already have a development vision.
“We're the City of Glass. I don't know how far we can go up, but I’d like for people to be able to go up a couple floors and just walk around the outside of the atrium to see what our city is doing,” Mr. Smith said.
The possible future site for the school and cultural center is currently a vacant plot of land that sits on the corners of the intersection of Collingwood Boulevard and Palmwood Avenue.
“We want to draw people,” he said. “That could be a key selling point where people will want to visit that spot, take a look at this city and see how it is expanding, and in many cases blowing up. Maybe people can sit up there and see the fireworks downtown.”
Having input from the residents is a large part of the initial phase of the proposed project. They are being encouraged to weigh in on what they would like to see, including the center's activities, purpose, and use.
“During this preliminary phase, we’re getting input from residents, businesses, and community organizations within and along the Dorr Street corridor and sharing with them what the African-American cultural and performing arts center would symbolize,” said urban planning Realtor Taron Cunningham.
The process will consist of outreach, more listening sessions, continued citizen input and collection of data.
“Every city’s skyline and neighborhood has defining landmarks and references, so we were able to collect and gather what in the community's mind they see as defining buildings, streets, neighborhoods, that's important to them,” Mr. Cunningham said.
Reflective of the excitement, many listening session attendees have already shared an abundance of items they deem important.
“Some of them filled out a couple more sheets because they had so much that they wanted to share as to the three items of what defines community to them, and what landmarks they would like to see in the future,” Mr. Cunningham said.
Showing interest in the proposed project, former Toledo Mayor Carty Finkbeiner attended the earlier listening session at Indiana Avenue Missionary Baptist Church in Toledo.
The organization has already entered into peripheral discussions with key area leadership and plans to use the Belmont Neighborhood Savings Club as an example of how a stakeholders can have a direct economic impact on the growth of a city.
The Belmont Neighborhood Saving Club was a neighborhood organization that collaborated on a vision to stimulate economic development in 1948. The group broke ground on a $100,000, equivalent to $1.2 million in purchasing power today, community investment known as the Belmont Enterprise.
The project was a multiuse facility with bowling lanes, a skating rink, and a multipurpose event space that allowed African-Americans access after being turned away from other noninclusive facilities.
The African American Legacy Project embraces and uses successful historical examples, such as the Belmont Neighborhood Saving Club, as footprints for its endeavors.
“We have been generally talking with TPS and the Toledo Museum of Art to partner in the process,” Mr. Smith said. “We're talking to the community about the impact a proposed Cultural Center and School of the Arts K-8 could have on the community.”
The organization also uses the success of the King Arts Complex cultural center in Columbus as a blueprint. The center serves as a source for cultural and educational activities as well as a facility for special events.
“Our goal is to be just as important to this community,” the organization said in a statement.
Additionally, the organization envisions a coffee shop that will attract young people to feel comfortable socializing, networking, and even hanging out.
“We are now telling them this community can work to meet your needs and you can feel comfortable here,” Mr. Smith said. “Dare to dream here. Be a part of what's happening, much like any other community does.”
Founded in 2004, the African American Legacy Project of Northwest Ohio works to shape the future through research, preservation and documentation of the past and present.
The project will continue to host listening sessions that will allow local residents to express their interests.
For more information about the project and its initiatives, visit https://www.africanamericanlegacy.org/.
First Published August 28, 2023, 12:00 p.m.
