Business View Magazine - October 2016 117
provements such as pavement, sewers, sidewalks,
street lights, trails, and streetscaping, hoping to so-
lidify Marion’s place as a regional hub for business,
urban-living, and entertainment. “Most of it is going
to be funded by bonding and a local option sales tax,”
Treharne says. “And we are offering incentives for re-
development in the area. We’ve been buying quite a
bit of property, and as we buy the property, we make
that part of an incentive package to draw in new in-
vestment.”
Attracting business investment is important to the city,
because, by some, Marion is considered merely a bed-
room community of nearby Cedar Rapids, especially
since it doesn’t yet have a large commercial tax base.
“That’s what we’re trying to grow with our Corridor Proj-
ect,” he says. Another roadway project on the north
side of town is called Tower Terrace Road. “That’s
where we see our next commercial corridor taking
hold,” he adds. “We’re using a lot of regional transpor-
tation dollars to fund that project. We’ve been working
with Cedar Rapids and other metropolitan communi-
ties to develop it.”
On the east end of town, the redevelopment of a
small airport is underway. “It was a private airport,”
Treharne says, “and when the owners decided to sell,
we purchased it through a public/private partnership.
And because the City now owns the fixed-base opera-
tions, we are eligible for state funding assistance. The
Cedar Rapids airport has a great deal of commercial
activity and a lot of people have their private planes
there, but it’s not conducive to an easy-in, easy-out. If
we rebuild our airport, with between a four- and five-
thousand foot runway, we’ll be able to have very easy
access for smaller general aviation planes. The idea
would be that we could become more of the business
airport for private companies. I think there’s a big mar-
