Community Engagement

The Downtown Albany Strategy is grounded in public engagement with the people who know Downtown best. Over 2,300 Albany residents, workers, students, business owners, and community leaders helped define what Downtown needs most—and where focused investment and coordination can have the greatest impact.  This engagement anchored the Strategy in local experience, built shared understanding and alignment, and helped ensure recommendations are practical, targeted, and ready to advance.

Engagement at a glance graphic. 1,000 participants at public workshop and open house. 200 people engaged at Palace Theater pop-up event. 730 responses to questionnaires. 100 organizations across 35 roundtables with 210 participants. 120 business drop-ins. 40 young adults at a youth roundtable.

How Engagement Informed the Strategy

Developed through extensive input from Albany stakeholders, the following community growth principles guided decisions for Albany’s future growth:

  • Attract and retain residents
  • Grow and diversify jobs
  • Create vibrancy and increase visitation
  • Attract private funding
  • Reverse vacancy
  • Ensure growth benefits all

Engagement informed where investments will concentrate, how programs are structured, and how progress is measured. Community priorities highlighted:

  1. Focusing where visible change builds confidence. Concentrate early action in places where improvements can be experienced quickly and where multiple moves reinforce each other.
  2. Delivering more housing through reuse + infill. Expand the number and mix of homes Downtown to power vitality and support a stronger neighborhood.
  3. Making Downtown feel safe, comfortable, and welcoming. Invest in lighting, crossings, sidewalks, public space improvements, and steady maintenance.
  4. Building street life with strong ground floors and community gathering places. Support storefront readiness, activation, and year-round reasons to spend time Downtown.
  5. Using repeatable programs to scale results. Pair catalytic projects with clear, consistent tools that can be used in multiple locations—fairly and transparently.

Moving from Vision to Action

Phase 1: Set the Direction focused on understanding the priorities for growth, impact, and how to measure success. Community input identified the top priorities for downtown, which informed growth targets and evaluation criteria for downtown investments.



In Phase 2: Focus the Strategy, community engagement helped inform investments using the priorities identified in Phase I community engagement. In this Phase, the Albany community provided feedback on development opportunities, policies, and programs that are under consideration.

Across both phases of engagement, themes stayed consistent:

  • Housing and reuse are essential to Downtown’s future—paired with everyday services that make daily life work. 
  • Public safety and comfort—lighting, crossings, sidewalks, and maintained public space—are foundational. 
  • Street life and small businesses are what make Downtown feel welcoming and worth returning to. 
  • Connections matter: corridors and gateways should reduce “psychological distance” between districts.

Now, engagement shifts from planning to implementation—sharing clear guidelines, inviting project proposals, and reporting back on what is selected, why, and how projects progress over time. Empire State Development will continue to share information about the DTAS Funds and how to apply.

Community Engagement Phase Summaries

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