As sculptors, Roger Halligan and Jan Chenoweth travel and sell their pieces across the country.
When the couple was looking for a new home to produce their art work, they quickly were sold on Chattanooga. Lured by a 4-year-old grants program to help "creatives" relocate into the city, Ms. Chenoweth said they agreed to move into Jefferson Heights three years ago. Next month, the couple will relocate their studio from the North Shore business incubator into the Rossville Avenue art district only a block from their home.
"We could live most anywhere, but we've really found Chattanooga to be an awesome place for artists like us," Ms. Chenoweth said.
More than two dozen other artists also have taken advantage of the incentives offered through the privately funded ArtsMove Chattanooga program to move into the Southside. Artists and other "mobile entrepreneurs" say they are drawn to a city that offers natural beauty, a low cost of living and improving urban attractions.
Stephen Culp, who came up with the idea of his "eb-based SmartFurniture company while at Stanford Law School in the 1980s, returned to his former hometown of Chattanooga a decade ago "because I wanted to live in a place that had an entrepreneurial spirit, and a soul.
"With an industrious history and the ability to transform itself, Chattanooga has the makings of a full-fledged entrepreneurial success story," he said.
Luring such young people to Chattanooga marks a stark turnaround from the early 1980s when Chattanooga's population declined. Although the "Scenic City" annually draws millions of tourists to Lookout Mountain and the Tennessee Aquarium, many of those who graduated from local schools chose to leave Chattanooga in the 1970s and 1980s.
"Chattanooga is now a place people really want to come to and be a part of," said former City Councilwoman Linda Bennett, who heads the "Choose Chattanooga" campaign to sell the city to entrepreneurs, artists and retirees. "That wasn't always true in the past."
Chattanooga has put out its welcome mat to lure new businesses and residents. Over the next 25 years, state and local governments have pledged to provide Volkswagen of America and its suppliers more than $1 billion of tax breaks, incentives and infrastructure improvements for picking Chattanooga as its only U.S. car production site. Choose Chattanooga, backed with city, county and foundation funds, also is extending the ArtsMove program to offer more grants to artists who relocate into targeted areas of the city.
ArtsMove provides up to $2,500 to help cover moving expenses and offers a network of support for those who relocate to Chattanooga's Southside. Artists who agree to live in targeted neighborhoods also have received up to $15,000 off their mortgage loans if they agree to stay in those homes at least five years.
To date, 30 working artists and artisans have moved into revitalizing neighborhoods, buying homes collectively valued at more than $4.9 million.
"Even more important than the infusion of capital into our local economy, we have seen the individuals who have joined our community via ArtsMove truly invest in their neighborhoods," said Jessica Martin, the former program administrator for ArtsMove and a senior fellow for CreateHere.
John Petrey, another sculptor who relocated to Chattanooga from Orlando, Fla., with his wife, Peggy, has been part of that transformation. The commercial building he bought on Main Street has been revitalized into part of the emerging Main Street Arts District, and he recently acquired a rooming house off Mitchell Street.
"We looked all over the country before we moved here, but we really found that Chattanooga has a great sense of community and the people here are very friendly and genuine," he said. "Real estate prices here are very reasonable so we could acquire the kind of space we needed for our work and easily get around to customers around the country. I think there's a great potential for even more growth in the arts community in the future."
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