Destination Okemah:
Placemaking in Action
An Atlas Placemaking Action Plan
background
Folks in Okemah have been hard at work over the last few years to reimagine the City’s future and capitalize on the potential to become an Oklahoma tourist destination. As the home of American singer-songwriter Woody Guthrie, the Native American Muscogee Nation tribe, and the rich Oklahoman narrative of the Wild West, Okemah is uniquely positioned to welcome visitors from around the world.
Cultural tourism like this accounts for about 40% of all tourism worldwide. And, a little closer to home, the Oklahoma travel and tourism industry generated a record $9.6 billion in direct spending by an estimated 21.5 million visitors in 2018. Okemah wants in.
To effectively become a culturally rich destination, Okemah will:
- strengthen the downtown district
- establish a tourism ecosystem
- activate the newly crafted brand
Since October 2021, a group of seventeen Okemah stakeholders has been serving as a Placemaking Steering Committee, working alongside Atlas Community Studios to develop a plan towards this vision. This community driven process, supported by the USDA’s Rural Business Development Grant program, was informed first through community feedback gathered during the March 2020 Brownfield Redevelopment Visioning Session and further reinforced during a public engagement event with consultant Lorie Vincent of Acceleration By Design. Together, the Committee has brainstormed ideas, debated concepts, voted on projects, and ultimately, identified a handful of projects that, if realized, can help Okemah become an even stronger and more vibrant community.
What is placemaking?
Do you know those moments when you’re walking through town and you think, “Wouldn’t it be great if Okemah had….” or “I’ve always thought it would be cool if Woody Park was….”. These thoughts are seeds of placemaking. If you plant the seed deeper and begin working to build or attract the things you wish Okemah had or begin working with community members to improve a public place, you become a placemaker. Okemah is rich with placemakers. If you dig this idea even deeper, and begin thinking about how people and organizations and leaders in Okemah could work together to make this change and this growth even bigger, now you’re talking about transformative placemaking. It’s a powerful and meaningful shift.
Projects that do one or more of these things will help you build a strong town through your work:
Build community wealth through economic and/or social development
Retain and / or increase population
Improve overall quality of life
Identified goals
Want to get involved?
Interested in joining the team to bring these ideas to life? All of the ideas in this plan are only possible with your support!
Fill out the online form and someone will be in touch soon.
steering committee members
The Placemaking Steering Committee is a time-limited group of residents, business owners, and community leaders working together to brainstorm ideas that can help establish Okemah as a tourist destination. The Steering Committee does not have ownership of any project, they are not a formalized group – simply passionate people who are interested in creative solutions for moving downtown forward. These individuals shared more than their own ideas and visions for the future of Okemah – they represented their friends, family members, community groups and connections – with the best of intentions for making Okemah a stronger, healthier, and more vibrant community for every person who calls it home.
Thank you to the following individuals for volunteering your time and effort to this process!
Andrew Benson Andy Tucker Bert Robison Brandon Speir Connie Wood Emily Anderson Jay Stovall Jayne Hughes John Copeland | Julie Stovall Lylah Sparks Obie Garcia Pamela Thompson Randy Norman Rebecca Fernandez Shane Anderson Shannon Speir |