By Zac Chapman / Assistant News Director

The city of St. Cloud is bringing in strategists to examine the vision for the future of its downtown with a goal of rebooting the historic area.

The summit is exploring lessons learned from American downtowns throughout COVID-19. The event is bringing community partners, businesses and others together with the goal of increasing the quality of downtown’s vision.

Four speakers are giving presentations at the summit.

A Top 100 Most Influential Urbanist, Chris Leinberger, is the downtown strategist and investor.

Tobias Peter is Assistant Director of the American Enterprise Institute’s Housing Center, and is focusing on housing market trends and policy.

Mayor Dave Kleis and CentraCare CEO Ken Holmen are speaking about St. Cloud’s unique opportunity to create an active walkable downtown through strategic investment in housing and workforce amenities.

The downtown summit is Monday, Dec. 12 at 6 p.m at St. Cloud’s River Edge Convention Center. The room will open at 5:30 p.m. for a pre-event social and networking. It is free to attend.