Local entrepreneurs want to turn a boom in new businesses into an urban renaissance Like many born and raised in Bakersfield, California, Austin Smith has made peace with the city?s reputation. Built on oil and agriculture, the city of half a million in the state?s rural Central Valley, known by outsiders for its unique strain of country music and long-running role as a punchline for Johnny Carson, has traditionally been stereotyped as unsophisticated and backwards.
?It?s like a California version of the New York versus New Jersey thing?but maybe worse,? Smith says. ?You?re so close to one of the biggest metro areas in the country, but never quite there.?
Like many of his generation, Smith, 37, moved to bigger cities in search of opportunity. In his case, he sought work in urban planning and commercial development in Los Angeles and the Bay Area. But as he developed a passion for downtown revitalization, he began wondering, why not Bakersfield" He returned to his hometown in 2014 with a hunch that the city was ripe for redevelopment, and soon began work on what would become the 17th Place Townhomes. Since opening in 2016, the high-end three-story, 44-unit downtown development represents the first market-rate housing built in the city?s core in decades. It?s not every day the city gets new housing, complete with a dog park, fountains, and a fire pit. Now that the development is fully leased?not a small accomplishment for new housing asking the highest rent in t...