Grass Valley is going to keep its downtown plaza going into the future. Tuesday evening city council approving the decision to close Mill Street between West Main Street and Neal Street permanently and begin planning for a major transition. According to a survey by the Greater Grass Valley Chamber of Commerce, approximately 1400 people responded with 76 percent in favor of keeping Mill Street as a walkable shopping space. Businesses were a little less excited with City Manager Tim Kiser saying the numbers are closer to 60 percent in favor of the closure. Kiser says businesses deserve to know what the plan is going to be.

Businesses have had to shift models in order to adjust to the COVID-19 pandemic which led to the initial closing of Mill street in June.
Kiser also stressed the need to be all in on this commitment because a partial commitment will not be successful.

Total project cost for the transition which will include parklets and furniture along with some infrastructure and accessibility improvements to be around 4 million dollars and will take about a year from now to complete. As part of a separate item, council approved 2.4 million dollars of American Rescue Plan funding to support the change. An additional 1.5 million will come from the general fund as well as an ongoing commitment of 50 to 100 thousand dollars for upkeep and management of the space.