Centerville, South Dakota, is about 40 miles southwest of Sioux Falls and has about 900 residents, but it has become known in the state for a turnaround that local leaders say began with a tougher approach to vacant storefronts. After years of struggling with declining Main Street activity, the town’s officials and business owners have pointed to a vacant building ordinance adopted by the City Council in 2017 as a key tool for changing downtown momentum.
Jared Hybertson, the town’s economic development coordinator, said the purpose of addressing vacancies is to make it harder for central business district deterioration to persist. “Vacancies in the central business district are a detriment to your city,” Hybertson said, adding that he hears from other communities looking for guidance because the issue is widespread across South Dakota.
Before the ordinance, Centerville had 14 vacant storefronts in a downtown area that spans only a few square blocks, according to the report. Hybertson said he was frustrated by the number of vacant buildings and described the message vacancies can send in a small town—either a community is growing or it is “dying,” with little in between. He said the ordinance is intended to break that pattern by pushing owners to act on their properties.
Under the 2017 vacant buildings ordinance, Centerville established a registration system for vacant properties and used building inspections, warning letters, threats of fines, and eventual fines to prompt owners to address the problems, Hybertson said. He said the ordinance has given the city a way to press property owners while still working with them to reach outcomes that keep buildings from continuing to decline.
Alongside the ordinance, the Centerville Development Corporation has pursued property acquisitions and redevelopment, Hybertson said. Over roughly the past decade, officials said, the group has undertaken efforts to buy and rehabilitate or buy and tear down nearly a dozen dilapidated or deserted downtown buildings, and many of those sites are now occupied by new businesses. New additions downtown have included a women’s clothing boutique, a salon, a tattoo parlor, a discount retail store, and two restaurant locations, the report said, along with a historic building converted into a combination museum, art gallery and visitors center.
Hybertson said the effort has been citywide and that bringing new businesses downtown has made the area more attractive to visitors and helped support the local economy. He also linked the new activity to increases in sales tax revenues, describing the ordinance as a “joint citywide effort” that allows city leaders to give property owners “a little push” to act.
Paula Jensen, a vice president with the community development group Dakota Resources, said many rural parts of South Dakota have faced population and economic downturns over past decades and that vacant downtowns can create a broader sense of decline. “We see what the end game is if we don’t pay attention to this,” Jensen said, and she added that revitalization efforts in small towns are unlikely to recreate earlier eras when people came to downtown frequently for agricultural commerce and personal connections.
Jensen said downtown revitalization still matters because attracting new commercial, retail and service businesses can spur wider community growth. She said the goal is not nostalgia for past decades but instead using Main Streets as places to “rejuvenate downtowns and make them lively places again.” She described revitalization as a decision to improve incrementally and to show long-term commitment, rejecting the idea that the work is merely “putting flowers on Main Street to beautify it.”
While the ordinance can offer a mechanism to address vacancies, Hybertson said the process requires time and negotiation to get properties sold or redeveloped. He said officials use the ordinance while also pursuing “fostering a relationship and building trust,” noting that many owners do not know what to do with their buildings. The report cited the redevelopment of an aging historic building into the museum/community center as an example in which repeated discussions ended with an agreement for the owner to sell for $6,000, supported by about $100,000 in grants and another $100,000 from the development corporation.
Other towns have looked to Centerville’s approach, but implementing policies that affect private property can be difficult, Hybertson said. He acknowledged that the ordinance can become “tricky and controversial when it comes to property rights,” and he said officials also must manage ongoing challenges that affect small-town businesses. The report noted recent closures of a Mexican restaurant and a coffee shop in Centerville, and Hybertson said it can feel like “one step forward and two steps back.”
The report also described how other municipalities are still working through the practical side of enforcing similar policies. Officials from the city of Hurley contacted Hybertson and enacted a vacant building ordinance in October 2024, but the policy had not been implemented yet, said Hurley city finance officer Marcy Hillman. Hillman said Hurley, which has about 385 residents and is about 30 miles southeast of Sioux Falls, has struggled to enforce its ordinance because it has only four city employees and relies on Hillman to perform many municipal tasks.
Beyond enforcement and redevelopment plans, the report highlighted business owners who said they see new opportunities in reusing existing buildings. Christen Cunningham, who and her husband moved back to Centerville from Colorado and bought a building for a women’s clothing store, said her business benefited from community-wide efforts that create “room for opportunity,” adding that people still tell her they can’t believe the boutique is operating in Centerville. She said her future plans include renovating the second floor of her shop into short-term rental units and purchasing the former bowling alley next door, with hopes to convert it into more boutique space or an event hall, and she pointed to relationships as a central benefit of downtown redevelopment.
By focusing on downtown redevelopment and finding new uses for existing structures, Centerville’s leaders and business owners said the town has been able to embrace its roots while building a future. Cunningham said relationships are the biggest blessing of her work and described her mission as helping women feel important and valued, while Hybertson and Jensen said the broader lesson is that revitalization takes persistence, trust-building and long-term commitment.