Home | Style | Life
C H A D RONC HE T T I and the
18 - HOUR D O W N TO W N WRITTEN BY ALYSSA FORD | PHOTOGRAPHY BY DAN JANDL
C
had Ronchetti knows the actual moment that he fell in love with Duluth. It was late fall and he was coming over the top of Thompson Hill just as the sun was rising and a drift of sea smoke was rolling toward the bridge. “The sea smoke was alive with the colors of the rainbow and I just thought to myself, ‘This place is magical and I never want to leave,’” says Ronchetti. Though he’s only been in Duluth for 10 years, Ronchetti has embedded himself deep in the fabric of the city. He’s a jovial fixture at business mixers and Chamber events and even snagged the “People’s Choice Award” at the 2023 Celebrity Dance Challenge fundraiser for the Minnesota Ballet. But he knows full well that the pressure is on. As the city’s new Director of Planning and Economic Development, it’s his job to help solve the housing crisis. And fast. “There’s an incredible amount of weight on Chad’s shoulders right now,” says Rachel Johnson, president at APEX. “We’re all hoping that he’s going to be our knight in shining armor.” When it comes to the extreme housing shortage, Ronchetti is full of ideas. But he’s particularly zeroed in on revitalizing Duluth’s sagging downtown. Conventional wisdom holds that to resuscitate a downtown, a city must attract diverse retail, update the sidewalks and street lights, put together an inspired calendar of community events and lure in some authentic mom-and-pop restaurants. Ronchetti disagrees. He thinks a downtrodden downtown needs people. “You can work your tail off to make a downtown with all the flashy things, but if there’s nobody there, it’s still a dead downtown,” he says. Ronchetti says the fastest way to get people into downtown Duluth is to give them what they’re really craving: housing. Ronchetti even has a
tagline for this inversion. He calls it “Roofs Before Retail.” The philosophy behind the downtown revitalization is simple: it’s the beating heart of a city’s tax base. “There are really smart people who have done analyses of who’s paying taxes and who’s not,” says Shaun Floerke, president of the Duluth Superior Area Community Foundation. “And the way America works is, if your downtown is thriving, and paying taxes, it’s supporting the rings, and the burbs, and the neighborhoods. It never works the other way. You can’t tax a two-bedroom house on 1.2 acres and expect it to support the U.S. Bank building downtown. It will not work. So if your downtown crumbles, your tax base crumbles.” To get the housing pipeline really flowing–in downtown Duluth and elsewhere–Ronchetti envisions an in-house team of city government liaisons who could work one-on-one with housing developers from project ideation to completion. These project ambassadors would be able to explain the bureaucratic contours of City Hall and help developers get all the necessary permits. Within City Hall, these go-betweens would advocate for projects and keep the momentum rolling forward. “I think there’s a way to make the city a critical partner, rather than just something a housing developer has to begrudgingly deal with,” says Ronchetti. Ronchetti also envisions a priority system that could provide extra TLC–and maybe even a fast track–to the developments that feed the most housing-hungry people. At the top of that list: creative adaptive reuse projects turning old office stock into apartments or condos. Even better if those creatively adapted buildings are downtown. Just 43, Ronchetti says he’s absolutely dedicated to getting maximum density–and maximum housing–out of every square block, particularly in Duluth’s core. “I’m putting everything into this,” he says. “If our next mayors agree, I can easily see myself in this job for 20 years.”
84 | NORTH
HOME UNITE
PREMIERE ISSUE 2024 | 85