- Over the last several years, the cities of Midland and Odessa and private citizens have poured tens of millions of dollars into their respective downtowns.

So not surprisingly, there's a lot to show for those big investments, a lot for citizens of both cities to enjoy.

If you haven't been downtown lately, there's a good chance you don't know what you're missing.

So tonight, we're going to take a look at what's new in downtown Midland and downtown Odessa.

We'll talk with two major investors and the director of Midland's soon to open Centennial Park.

So this evening we ask, why go downtown?

(energetic instrumental music) First this evening, a visit to a sparkling couple of blocks in downtown Odessa, and a chat with the investors who made a large part of the sparkle happen.

A few years ago, Tobv and Sondra Eoff sold their family business, then decided to invest in downtown Odessa.

Both natives, he a graduate of Odessa High School, she, Permian, they say they wanted to give back to the town they believe has given them so much.

Sentimental about the memories of the downtown hustle and bustle of their youth, they decided to build a first-class hotel, the Marriott, which includes a restaurant and a bar.

It opened last October, but they went several steps further including a solar powered Starbucks, just next door, by partnering with the city of Odessa on construction of an attached civic center and a newly remodeled Ector Theater, an old movie theater, which will soon serve as a venue for live performances, and they lined up a Torchy's Taco just across the street.

We caught up with the Eoffs recently, in downtown Odessa.

Thank you all so much for having us here.

Why should folks come downtown?

- I think it's something that you need to come see, here at the hotel to understand, when we had a vision of doing this, we did it so that we could bring a little bit back from all of the areas we'd traveled to, and that people that don't get to go out of town much that they can come here and feel like they're somewhere else, and I think we've accomplished that.

- Come here, if you get a chance just come see, just the hotel and the amount of art that's in the hotel, I don't think people really realize that, we're also trying to develop a little bit of a museum quality to the hotel as well.

So there's some great sculpture, some great art here at the hotel, a good way to pass some time, spend some time at the bar, maybe go over to Torchy's and do something as well, but just like to see people just come visit.

- And there's a lot of history downtown, and we grew up here and that's why we invested in downtown, there's just a lot to do.

We have a bar here at the hotel that's a really fascinating bar that people love to come see and eat at.

And then we have Barrel & Derrick restaurant here at the hotel, and Torchy's right across the street, and just various places to eat and things to do.

And more coming soon.

- Yeah, the bar that we have is called White Buffalo, which was actually a bar that was originally in Odessa, I think from the 40s to the 80s, actually, it was at the end of the Golden West, and it was a place known for business deals being made, so we, basically, kind of wanted to breathe life back into that and that legendary bar.

And then the Barrel and Derrick, obviously, it's kind of reminiscent of the oil and gas industry, paying homage to that.

Then we also have the Ector Theater that's been totally renovated, and currently not open, but we'll be as soon as we get through the COVID.

- You could have chosen to build this hotel any place in Odessa, tell me why you chose downtown.

- Everything grows to the East, and we just really wanted to do something in the heart of Odessa.

And that's what the city was working on and wanting to redevelop and re-revitalize, and we knew that this would be the catalyst for it.

So it just sounded like a wonderful thing to do, we'd spent time here in our youth and just wanted to be a part of it all.

- Midland and Odessa both, I mean, they're both doing great projects to revitalize their downtowns, but most communities across the United States are trying to do the same thing, obviously, great economic impact, but certainly a sense of pride, I think starts with every community in their downtown, you know, from their town square all the way out.

And you know, when that gets a little bit more dilapidated and old, I don't think that the city pride's there the image that we want to create for Odessa, hence, why we wanted to do something like this downtown.

- I noticed that there are lots and lots of art pieces here in the hotel.

Tell me the inspiration for those pieces.

- Most everything in the hotel has something to do with either oil and gas or the history of the area.

But the one piece that we commissioned in the very front of the hotel, it represents energy, but it represents all forms of energy, so the oil and gas industry is what represented in that.

Also we have the atomic energies represented in it, you'd have to see it at night to see that function of it work.

It's also a kinetic sculpture, so the wind moves it, and that represents the form of wind energy.

And then our Starbucks is totally powered by a solar panel also that tracks the sun.

So we wanted this to really be the energy center of the Permian Basin, hence, why we wanted to put all those themes into the art, and it flows throughout the hotels as well in the interior.

- Well, obviously, you all have made this particular area of downtown Odessa spectacular.

Are there other things that folks could do downtown?

- Pre COVID, we had the summer concerts where you could sit outside and listen to the concerts, and that was here before the hotel, and food trucks are often here that as the groups come, many of the events that the city holds are downtown.

And of course, we were very honored to have Torchy's move in across the street, so that's a big draw and other entrepreneurs moving in and have been here for a long time.

- Yeah, in the winter they had ice skating here downtown.

- Um-hum, um-hum.

- Which is nice.

Of course, we mentioned the Ector theater earlier, once COVID lifts, we will be able to open that, so that's gonna be a great venue for downtown.

And there's a couple other bars that are actually getting ready to go ahead and open, I believe, once the governor loosens the rules a little bit.

So I think there'll be opening here in the near future.

- All right, talk a little bit about what you all see going on downtown in the next couple of months.

- Well, in the next couple months, the Copper Rose building, the name of the bar.

- Yes.

- That's opening up.

- Yes, that's a live venue.

- Yeah, it will open in the next month or so actually.

There's another one that Bradley Marquez, who is the famous football player in the area, will be opening, but that won't be till after COVID probably, a year from now so.

Definitely, set things back for downtown construction.

After that, there was plans for other people who were looking to do residential downtown, everything from, you know, grocery stores to retail.

Typically, you've probably seen this in other areas, they do the retail on the bottom, and they would do like lofts for residential above.

So we, gosh, we probably saw three different plans for that pre COVID.

I expect once that's done, you'll probably see some of those happen too.

- I see that you all are pretty sentimental about Odessa.

Tell me a little bit more about that.

- Well, when we sold our business in 2015, we were trying to think of a place to give back in Odessa, because Odessa had given so much to Tobv's family when his family started the business and then us when we purchased the business later on, and we're just looking at various things, and when the city came to us and said, "Hey, we wanna revitalize downtown."

Just having grown up here, as we talked about the sentimental, we'd gone to the movies at the Ector, and just had lots of fond memories, and we hear about them all the time from others, of their fond memories of this area.

It just seemed like the ideal opportunity to give back.

- I mean, I can remember, we would walk downtown, you know?

- Yes.

- We you still remember the stores all being downtown, and certainly the theaters being downtown, there was the Scott and the Ector, which is the one we mentioned that's been renovated recently.

Gosh, yeah, we have lots of memories is just, growing up here and spending time downtown, so I'd like to see that happen for other generations too.

(energetic instrumental music) - If you haven't driven through downtown Midland in a while, you are in for a surprise.

On a recent Friday night, we found it popping, plenty of restaurants from which to choose, micro businesses selling their wares and open market, a stunning 76,000-square-foot convention center, and as soon to open smashing four-acre park.

It's worth noting that neither the nearly $43 million convention center, nor the $18 million Centennial Park used local sales or property tax dollars, but were funded with visitor dollars through the hotel-motel taxes.

But there have been hundreds of millions of dollars infused into downtown Midland from private investors over the years as well.

One such investor is Wes Perry, a lifetime Midlander.

We visited with the former mayor recently in Midland Tower, his downtown office building.

- Wes, thanks so much for spending some time with us.

Tell us why folks should come downtown.

- There's a lot of fun stuff going on, from new restaurants to the park that's opening soon, it's just, you know, it's it's not the same downtown as we have seen for the forever, really, it's brand new, it's pretty fun.

- You got interested in downtown really early, could you tell us a little bit about that?

Well, you know, first project was the petroleum building across the street, and it was thinking that I'm gonna be here for a long time instead of renting I wanna own something and try to just make something better.

And that was really where it started, and probably didn't understand anything about what that was looking like, but I'm a Midlander, been here a long time, and I just felt like that's a good thing to do.

And kind of like buying a home, if you want to think of it that way, just better to buy rather than rent, so that's what started it.

- Now you own a building right across from the park, tell us about that and then also about some of the other businesses that have opened up along here.

- So that's been a fun project because we had a bunch of office buildings and decided to just concentrate on one of the historic buildings, so they're just not, there only three downtown.

So I felt like let's try to develop this one, got on the national registry, and then was able to completely redevelop it with partners that were just great partners, and wanting to do something that's gonna be long lasting and preserving our history.

This particular building was built by Ralph Lowe, and my dad used to work for him in the sixties, and so there was some nostalgia there, but you know, it had gone into disrepair, just hadn't really been maintained very well, but you know, it's one of those things that just takes a little bit of vision and some money and go for it.

- And we're talking about Midland Tower.

- Yeah, Midland Tower, so there's, you know, the Opals restaurant, and of course, Cancun Grill's here, and then down the street, we've got P/I Social and these little micro markets that are really just giving these young folks an opportunity to realize their dreams.

It's fun to watch actually.

- What are you seeing in foot traffic with these new restaurants and the micro markets?

- It's not as good as it was in the 80s, but it's getting better.

And you just start to see all these young folks down, it's kinda cool to go in the afternoon and walk down to a micro market to get a coffee, and you'll see different ladies that are buying things, I mean, it feels like there's a lot of energy here, and I think in the fall and when the park opens, it'll even get more and more, because food trucks are coming in, there's just gonna be a lot of energy.

And really, there's just a lot of people behind this, with Concho and these businesses that have said, "You know what, let's invest here in downtown."

- You've talked a lot over the years about bringing back a vibrant downtown Midland.

Can you talk a little bit about that?

- If you wanna know about a city, the first thing, and you know nothing, you're gonna go downtown to see, okay, is this a good city?

And our downtown has just been neglected for a long, long time, and there were a lot of people that had kind of checked out.

And so it was sending the message to outsiders that Midland was not a good city, the downtown had been been abandoned, not that it's bad to have other places, suburban sites and so forth, but if people really wanna know about your city, they're gonna go downtown.

We just felt like it was super important to preserve this.

- A lot of folks say that there's no place to park downtown.

Can you disabuse them of that?

- You got to walk a little bit, that's the biggest issue, because there are three really pretty good sized parking garages, now you may have to walk a block or two, and that's just part of any downtown setting.

And that's part of the experience though, if you're able to park in a parking garage then on your way to work, you're picking up your cleaning, and you may stop a little store, you may get a coffee, whatever those are, that's the value of a walk in downtown.

And we've started it, we've got more living to put in here, we've got probably some more hotel rooms that need to come in, but that's, it just all feeds on itself, and I think we've got the start now with these little businesses on Wall Street.

- The park is gonna be opening up soon, what affect do you think that's going to have on downtown?

- It's a great question.

I think it will have a huge impact because there's just so much to see and do over there.

And, you know, with COVID it's gonna be a little bit of a slow start, but I think you'll start seeing concerts and all sorts of events, be it movies in the park.

I mean, if you go to downtowns that are vibrant, Houston and Dallas have two, I mean, there are people there 24 hours a day, or for sure during the evenings, probably, not here 24 hours a day, but it's really just the center of life.

And you'll see young people, we've got a dog park over there, these fun, little water features that are going, so there's just a whole lot for people to do.

- You're really nostalgic about old Midland.

Can you talk a little bit more about that?

- You know, at some point I just felt like Midland has given me so much and it's my turn to give back.

And that was why I ran for mayor, it's why I'm really involved in downtown, a lot of things we take for granted here, someone provided those in the past.

And so just to give a little bit, kind of pay it forward if you want to think of it that way, is my motivation and most people's motivation.

It really is about trying to do something for your community and being a catalyst, being an example, or whatever everyone's saying.

I think it's really important and it's fun on top of that, to see the energy to go in to these restaurants, you see these young people in it, just brings a smile to your face, give it a chance.

There are folks that still don't see downtown the way it, their picture of downtown is not what it is today, so once things kind of get moving again, I think just to say, come down to here and have some fun, 'cause it's not the same downtown as it was 10 years ago and sure not 20.

And it's just going to get better from this point on.

(energetic instrumental music) - The icing on the downtown Midland cake is sure to be the Centennial Park, a dazzling four-acre park in the town square, where Midland County Courthouse once stood.

The idea of building a park in downtown Midland began following the demolition of the Midland County courthouse in 2017.

Community leaders envisioned turning the four acres into an urban green space, inspired by two establish Texas parks, Discovery Green in Houston and Klyde Warren Park in Dallas.

In August, 2018, the Midland Downtown Park Conservancy, a nonprofit organization was formed to manage the project and hosted a news conference to announce the plans to the community.

Private donations covered 16 million of the $18 million price tag.

The balance came from the hotel-motel tax, paid by folks who visit Midland.

We visited with the park director, Stephanie Martin, as workers put the finishing touches on the park.

- Stephanie, thank you so much for meeting me here at this beautiful park.

Tell us the story of the park.

- So the park was kind of brought about in 2017. we had a couple of projects that were down here in this area that fell through and there were a few community leaders that said, "We need to do something with this space, let's create this gathering place in downtown Midland, to create a space for all to come and enjoy."

They kind of made their way, visited a few parks across the state of Texas, and really found some key features that would really be a draw to get people to the downtown area.

- Tell us what are some of the things that are gonna bring people to the downtown park.

We've got our dog park, you know, which is divided into a small and large dog park area, so and they're both fenced and it's off leash, so you can let your little four-legged friends run around.

We have a children's nature play, which is a really neat, unique feature to the area, it's actually developed in Germany, and it actually comes from sustainable forest in Austria, so it's, you know, trying to be eco-friendly and eco-conscious and making sure how can we kind of continue that path.

And then we have the splash pad, which is interactive for the kids, and then in the evenings, it'll just turn into a beautiful water dancing fountain.

- Lots of fun activities for the children.

What are some fun things for the adults?

- Yes, there are tons of tables and chairs throughout the park, so we have seating at cafe style tables for over 200 people.

A couple of the areas are actually covered areas, so covered pavilions to provide that shading because we know it gets really hot in our summers.

We'll also have different types of activities, we'll actually have four chest/checker tables that are going to be here on site, where you can kind of come up, grab a chair and play some games there.

And we're also gonna have some activity carts that you can kind of grab and go, and whether you wanna play some giant Jenga with some friends at the tables, or if you wanna grab a book off of our reading cart that we're gonna have on site, just trying to be all inclusive and whether you're 2 or 102, there will be something for you to enjoy here at the park.

- Well, I noticed that we have a little hill here at the park and on top of that hill is a beautiful tree.

Can you tell me the story of the tree?

- Sure, we have our Southern live Oak at the top of our tree.

You know, Centennial Park part of our logo has a symbol of a tree in it, and so that this tree for us it symbolizes growth and unity and a gathering place.

People driving into the downtown area and they see this tree on the top of the hill, we want them to see that and say, "Oh, let's go gather, let's go enjoy, let's have some fun, let's take some friends or family and enjoy this gathering place."

And and again, growth in unity is kind of what we see our symbol for the tree.

- Tell us about some of the events that you anticipate having here at the park.

- We are looking forward to all different types of events that take place here at the park.

You know, we'll grow into them, we wanna make sure we have a well-oiled machine before we will open up for large scale events, but we envision having daily programming, and this is outside of our activity cart that will be full of different games.

But we envision having some fitness classes taking place in the park, maybe some reading time, kind of a gathering place for storytelling for the kids, and even for adults having storytelling.

We're also looking forward to offering several different types of educational opportunities here at the park.

We plan on partnering, and we've been in talks with several different organizations, one is Keep Midland Beautiful, they're big when it comes to, how can we help our earth?

How can we help the longevity of it?

So little pieces along that area, but we also plan on partnering, you know, with maybe the master gardeners to provide some educational opportunities and teach people about the different trees that we have here on site and why we chose what we have out here.

All of our plants are either native or adapted plants for our type of environment here, so we really take pride on that.

And with that part of our system that we have in place is being water conscious, and how can we collect as much rainwater and runoff water as possible to kind of recirculate that and use that throughout our park for irrigation.

So we have our water recharge station, and again, we collect rainwater and we have what you call swales on the North and South side of the park, and then there's a section that runs North to South through that area, and it just kinda helps grab and collect the water, it goes into a reservoir and then it pumps out and we reuse that for irrigation purposes across the part.

So you'll see, you know, us watering the grass or all of our landscape areas, and we'll be able to recirculate that water and use it.

- Talk about the big movie screen.

- Yes, we have a large video board here, and there's so many different opportunities and you know, that the opportunities are just expanding with how we can use this.

One area obviously, let's say there's a live concert going on here in downtown and they're set up at the stage pavilion, we actually have two different locations in our great lawn that we can have a camera set up and that feed from that camera to the stage, we'll actually be able to project up onto that screen, and the screen is to the top left of our stage, so we'll be able to see that so wherever you're out in the park, if you can see that video board, you'll be able to see what's going on on the stage.

Another piece that we've been able to do is we've actually integrated it with the Bush Convention Center, so we can send a live feed to inside of the Bush Convention Center if it's an indoor, outdoor event, so anything that's taken place outdoors, you'll be able to see what's taken, you'll be able to watch it indoors and vice versa.

So if there's an event taking place in the Bush Convention Center with maybe a keynote speaker, we'll be able to project that out onto the video board.

And then of course several other other opportunities, advertising opportunities, and things along those lines, but really having that live feed during an event is gonna be exciting.

- All right, can you tell us when we can come and start making use of the park?

- Sure, we're hoping that we'll be able to have the fence come down and open the park in mid-November, mid-fall time is what we're looking at, we've had some delays with COVID, I think everyone kind of relate to that area, but we're definitely excited to share, to share Centennial Park with the community.

I mean, this is really, this is Midland's park, how can we really provide this social gathering location and, and even, you know, with the downtown area in general, it's not just for social gathering, but how can we help build onto the economic catalyst?

How can we help enhance our downtown environment and really encourage people to come down here and enjoy our downtown.

(energetic instrumental music) - And a final fun fact for Centennial Park, three laps around and you have walked a mile.

Why go downtown?

To eat, to drink, to shop and to play.

Our art piece this week is a 27-foot sculpture entitled Energy Ring by Jonathan Russell, and Saori Ide Russell of Berkeley, California.

The shape of the base references an oil drilling structure, the LED lighting within represents energy gathered from below rising up to give life to the elements above, the sculpture moves with the slightest wind in slow, graceful, unpredictable ways.

You can watch it move in front of the Odessa Marriott.

Thank you for watching this episode of One Question.

We'll be back each Monday at five, with answers to the questions you want to know from the people who know.

If you have a question send it to us at Next week, we'll ask the question, Defund the police?

We'll look at the meaning of the movement and talk with police chiefs.

I'm Becky Ferguson, good night.

(energetic instrumental music)