GOLDSBORO, N.C. – Visiting downtown Goldsboro looks vastly different than it did a decade ago. The same can be said for small-town downtowns across the state, and part of that is due to the North Carolina Main Street Program.

This week, the program held its annual conference in Goldsboro, with more than 800 people from over a dozen states attending.

What You Need To Know

  •  The 2024 N.C. Main Street Conference took place in Goldsboro

  •  The program helps provide and coordinate resources to revitalize rural downtowns

  •  More than 800 people registered to attend the conference, the largest of its kind in the country

  •  Next year's conference will take place in Mooresville

According to Liz Parham, director of the North Carolina Main Street & Rural Planning Center, the program’s been able to make a major impact on North Carolina.

“The investments in downtowns have been significant. We've seen $5.2 billion invested in our Main Street Districts since the inception of the program in 1980,” Parham said. "Over the last year in particular, we saw $685 million invested in our Main Street Downtown Districts.”

The program works to coordinate resources, funding, opportunities and partnerships to bring investments, businesses and jobs to more rural downtowns.

Dr. Erin Smith Imafidon, owner of Goldsboro Pediatric Dentistry and Orthodontics, said the program helped greatly when they opened in 2016.

Along with the Downtown Goldsboro Development Corporation, they were able to get a grant from the N.C. Main Street Program to rehab an existing building.

“One-hundred percent helped, because, I mean, in starting a dental practice, it's a very cumbersome financial burden. And so to have the ability to use funds from other places is really the only reason why we were able to initiate construction and do it in a timely fashion,” Smith Imafidon said.

Eight years ago, she said there wasn’t much going on downtown, but they saw the potential.

Now, she said there are retail shops, restaurants, small businesses and entertainment all calling downtown home with their dental practice.

Parham said that’s happening in other towns too.

"We've had nearly 8,000 new businesses, net gain, new businesses that have opened up in our Main Street Districts since the inception of the program," Parham said about the growth statewide.

As the program wraps up, the largest statewide downtown revitalization conference in the country is already planning ahead.

Mooresville announced on Wednesday that it will host the 2025 conference.