On Friday a group of people from all over the state gathered at the St. James Hotel to learn skills to help their downtown areas grow.

The emphasis of these workshops: attractiveness, history, development.

The Main Street program nationwide has led to an increased awareness of our downtown cores, not as afterthoughts left abandoned to the suburbs, malls and strip shopping centers; but as thriving centers of commerce, filled with people who live and work in the same areas.

Selma has yet to realize the apex of this movement.

But there are signs the city has recognized the importance of working to preserve its core.

For instance, work continues on the corner of Water Avenue and Broad Street to rehabilitate the building that will eventually become the Selma-to-Montgomery Interpretive Center.

Just down Broad Street, the owner of once vacant and rundown buildings is renovating those structures to attract businesses.

The Selma City Council voted Tuesday night to see the old YMCA building on Broad Street stabilized, so it will be ripe for rebuilding.

While these efforts are in their ongoing stages, the potential is easy to recognize.

We have a rich heritage in this historical district that makes up downtown. We have storytellers and artists and retailers downtown to attract more people to our area.

Once those people are here, they will enrich the total area.

That’s the value of working with Main Street. That’s the value of this program nationwide.