The Shadow
COVINGTON, Va. (Virginian Review) — Walkability, recreation and steady investment in quality-of-life amenities have become defining features of Covington, according to City Manager Allen Dressler, who says long-term planning and community pride are reshaping the city’s future.
In a recent conversation with interviewer Gene Mundy, Dressler described a “livable community” as one where residents appreciate where they live and feel connected to their surroundings. He pointed to improvements in sidewalks, road paving, parks and public spaces as evidence of that investment.
“We get around town pretty well here, we’re friendly, and we’ve made a real investment in the improvement of our sidewalk system and our parks,” Dressler said. “Those small things matter to people, from young families to grandparents.”
Visitors’ reactions to downtown Covington, particularly Main Street, are often immediate, he said. Dressler recalled encounters with travelers who described the downtown as “beautiful,” especially during the holiday season, when decorative lighting and public spaces draw attention.
One such project, a small pocket park downtown, initially raised eyebrows but has since become a popular gathering spot. The park offers seating, greenery and a fountain, providing a place for residents and visitors to sit, read or enjoy nearby restaurants.
Looking ahead, Dressler said continued downtown investment remains a top priority. Maple Avenue, in particular, is undergoing a transition that includes plans for additional green space at Collins Park, where weddings, community events and photo opportunities are already taking place.
Another major project involves redevelopment of a former automated car wash on Maple Avenue into a regional firehouse museum representing the Alleghany Highlands. The city has also upgraded its public works facility to better blend with surrounding commercial areas and plans to extend sidewalks and lighting as redevelopment continues.
Dressler also highlighted plans for the former Rrooklands building, which the city envisions as a future small-business incubator. While cosmetic and accessibility improvements are still needed, he said the goal is to provide entrepreneurs with a starting point to launch new ventures.
Recreation and sports tourism, Dressler said, have played a central role in Covington’s revitalization strategy. Drawing on his early career experiences after graduating from Virginia Tech, Dressler saw firsthand how investment in sports facilities could drive economic activity.
That vision helped shape the development of the Jackson River Sports Complex, which now hosts tournaments from March through November. Dressler said tournament play generates measurable increases in local meals-tax revenue and supports restaurants, lodging and retail businesses.
The city has also invested in trails connecting the sports complex to downtown and surrounding neighborhoods, creating walkable corridors that link parks, river access and business districts.
Another contributor to the local economy and community identity is the Covington Lumberjacks, a collegiate summer baseball team that brings more than 30 seasonal residents to the area each year. Dressler said the team adds both cultural and economic value, noting that some players have gone on to professional baseball careers.
When asked what makes Covington attractive to families considering relocation or returning to the area, Dressler cited low crime, affordable housing, a strong school system and access to outdoor recreation. While the city lacks some national chain restaurants, he said nearby communities fill those gaps and Covington continues to build its own dining and entertainment options.
Looking five years ahead, Dressler said economic development and job growth remain critical goals. He expressed optimism about industrial interest in a joint city-county pad site in Low Moor and said housing improvements are equally important.
In closing, Dressler encouraged residents to promote Covington positively and take pride in their community.
“If you want to be something, you can be anything, but you’ve got to put in the effort,” he said. “With the support we’re getting, Covington can truly be something to be proud of.”
Transcript of the Podcast
Gene Mundy 0:32
Today we’re here with Alan Dressler, the City Manager of Covington, and we’re going to dive into what a walkable and livable city is all about. Alan, you’ve one of your primary themes has always been Covington is a walkable and livable city. I’d like to know your in your opinion, what does that mean?
Allen Dressler 0:53
A livable community is folks that appreciate where they live. We get around town pretty well here we’re friendly. We’ve made the city has made a real investment in the improvement of our sidewalk system, certainly our road paving. And you know, we see folks that are recognizing what I consider the small things. As we speak today, the gentleman that’s sitting up at the bench on the farmers market. There’s a grandchild that’s worried that he hasn’t moved in several times as she went by. I have a grandparent that caught me in Walmart not too long ago because her daughter was worried that there was not a pumpkin with the bears over at the Jackson river sport complex, but there was one with the bears on Durant road, so we’re seeing from young and old. I just got through speaking with staff to wish everybody a Merry Christmas and explain to them that I have received a numerous amount of cards and people say thank you. It that’s been a long time coming, because we have had our struggles. But the city, we’ve made a real investment in things. You know, our our swimming pool down there that was built in 1936 by the CC corps. We have a brand new pool. Well, brand new 1520, years now, but our park system, so our folks have the opportunity to do things and be and feel good about them, and the low crime in our community, our good education, again, all of that is positives to a livable community, sure.
Gene Mundy 2:37
So when a visitor first comes to Covington and they see Main Street. What should their first impression be? Wow.
Allen Dressler 2:45
And I’ve had that many times. There have been mornings that I have been over at our local coffee shop, and I’m not afraid to introduce myself to people. And we just had some visitors a few weeks ago from Iowa that stopped in and the first words out of their mouth, what a beautiful downtown we have. And I think that speaks well right now with the holiday season, everybody remarks about the lights in downtown, our little pocket park that everybody thought, well, that’s crazy idea. Well, it’s turned out to be a pretty good idea, because not only didn’t it clean up a spot in downtown Covington, but now it is presented a place to sit, enjoy your coffee, enjoy your taco from the restaurant next door, read a book and just listen to the fountain.
Gene Mundy 3:35
Yeah, that’s very true. What project that’s coming up excites you the most in the city of Covington,
Allen Dressler 3:44
we continue to invest in our downtown and right now, there’s a couple projects on Allen’s list with Maple Avenue. I’m very proud of what we have been able to accomplish on maple and our downtown area, I got a lot of folks question the mid city mall parking lot project. I think it turned out very well. It is a very friendly and clean area to now park your car. But Maple Avenue, we are in transition with several things, one of which is the hotel Collins park that we plan to add to that. Again, green space in your downtown is important. It will be a fun place to hang out begin with music. We’ve already had an Easter sunrise service, and we’ve had weddings, so we’re excited about that. Prom pictures, prom pictures, and you and I spoke of that not too long ago. It’s really it puts a smile on my face to see all the families taking various pictures, prom homecomings around the community. That’s pretty good. But we also we have a vision for the former automated car wash. On Maple Avenue. Our vision is to develop a nice firehouse museum that will represent the Allegheny Highlands. Also going with that being said, we have made an investment in our public works facility to make it look more commercial than industrial so it fits in with the rest of Maple Avenue. And then, once we accomplish our goal for the car wash, old car wash, then we’ll do our sidewalk and couple lamp posts, and then that will transition into the rest the city has also made an investment into what we refer to as the old Brooklands building. I was interested in it. We talked about, there’s a vision to fix that up, and certainly number one priority is to create a small business incubator for those that have the vision of having their own business, and we will be able to give them a kickstart down there.
Gene Mundy 5:59
I’d like to learn more about that maybe share as as the project progresses, might be something we could come back and talk about,
Allen Dressler 6:06
maybe and certainly right now, you know, in the pecking order things the museum is top the Brooklyn building, we’ve got some cosmetic work to do down there, and some accessibility work and Things of that nature, and but, yeah, look forward to again, continuing to spread the good news.
Gene Mundy 6:25
You know, we chatted in your office a couple weeks ago, and you brought up, you know, where did the idea of sports tourism come from that really led, maybe to the birth of the Jackson river sports complex.
Allen Dressler 6:39
So upon my graduation from Virginia Tech in 1984 I landed in Roanoke Salem and became the manager of a national lawn care company. And our company was responsible for putting the green stuff at what we all refer to as the Moyer complex in Salem in 1984 85 Salem downtown area probably not much different than Covington a few years ago. So they used the Moyer complex and created tournament play and recreation. And of course, along the way, they’ve invested in Salem stadium and things of that nature. So I told myself, when I turned 30, I’d make a career decision. And at 30, I decided to come back to Covington. So came back to Covington and continued in the lawn care business, the weed control, green grass, those kinds of things. And then a job came open with the city. And so I came and was fortunate 33 years ago. Here I am. So we immediately looked at our park system. I will say that the playground equipment at Main Street Park is what you and I
Gene Mundy 7:57
grew up. We still got some scratches from that. Yes,
Allen Dressler 8:01
as I mentioned, our pool built in 1936 it was tired. It was trees growing out of it when we were first tired on and we corrected that. So we put an investment right off the bat in our entire park system. The property over off of Edgemont drive, was just nothing but grown fields. It was farming
Gene Mundy 8:22
Hercules ball softball field one time that
Allen Dressler 8:25
went going all the way back to the rayon days. There was a ball field down there because there was industrial baseball was pretty popular in the heyday. And then once it became Hercules, they created field one in field two. So after Allen had gone through and had a game plan for the entire park system, thinking it’s going to take me a while. We were able to accomplish that in a matter of five to seven years. So that sets the stage for the bigger investment. So we went down, I will say that that park was designed in New Orleans in 1996 with Texas and Virginia Tech sugar bowl on a napkin, and that’s what it looks like today. The City did work with Allegheny foundation and was favorable of some monies to make some initial investments. And having been in Salem, and seeing what the Moyer complex was contributing to downtown Salem, I thought, well, that can happen here in covenant, Virginia. So here we are. We put the shovel on the ground in July of 2002 years later, we were playing tournament ball on the four fields, and then we chipped away and at it. As we come along, we were the first to host the boys travel baseball. And Salem was beginning to get away from recreation and concentrate more on the division one, division two and Division three. Sports. So it left the door open. We opened that door and walked through it, and had been very successful along the way the additions to the sport complex. Having grown up pretending to be a parent, pretending to be a grandparent, I wanted to be an eyesight of everything going on. So today, as a parent or grandparent, you can be at the cloverleaf four field area and see Johnny and Susie playing at the playground. You can enjoy Saturday Night Music at the amphitheater, and look to your left and see Johnny and Susie playing on the playground equipment. And then along the way, of course, we’ve added the basketball, the tennis, our trail along the river, which we’re going to be using as a connector from the Jackson river sport complex up get on Edgemont to Jackson Street, Durant road downtown Covington, And then come through dry run and Lord have mercy, you end up at the Jackson River Trail. I’m looking forward to that so you can go from one end to the other walk that trail every morning. But we see we see right now, once we start tournament play, which begins in first of March through first of November, we begin to see that increase, particularly in our meals tax, and we recognize that all of us folks here locally eat out, but we do see the spike during the course of that.
Gene Mundy 11:29
Yeah, one of the and to kind of use that as part of the conversation we had Josh with Josh on coming up the lodging and hotels and access, etc. I mean, bringing in those sports travel teams, getting them in the restaurant, getting them into hotels, Airbnbs, etc. Certainly, there’s some progress we have to make with with the hotels and bringing in some more name brand hotels. I don’t want to take Josh’s thunder, because he’s going to talk about that, but just any thoughts on that.
Allen Dressler 12:05
It is a challenge. And when we work with folks for the weekend tournaments, we use what we have here, but we also let folks know you’re only a half hour from Lewisburg to the sport complex, from Lexington, Botetourt to the sport complex. And most people will tell me, Alan, that ain’t no big deal, because there’s no stoplights when we play in Roanoke or Charlottesville, any place like that, we got a half hour stoplights to get through exactly. So, you know, again, investing in in the recreation, the tourism one certainly quality of life. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the Covington Lumberjacks. The Covington lumberjacks, folks probably don’t realize, but we have 30 plus new residents here in the Allegheny Highlands. Every summer. Those folks make investments in our community. I had a young man a few years ago bought a brand new truck while he was in Covington. But that quality baseball, you know, you and I grew up with the Boston Red Sox farm club and the Covington Astro farm club. We took our eye and, you know that leg Appalachian league became more demanding, so it went by the wayside. And I just happened to be in the right place at the right time for the valley League, they were looking expansion. We had just been recognized with a national award at Casey field for the field of the year, and that is a prestigious award, and we were the first athletic field in the state of Virginia to be recognized. And so with that being said, in the lumberjack baseball, it is high quality baseball. They don’t know any given night who’s in the stands making notes on how they play. So, and we’ve had some that have gone on to Major League Baseball. So, you know, again, all that has played in and you know, as as we continue the conversation, we’re trying to build a resume, and this resume that we’re building will attract companies, large industries, to come in here, and we’re getting closer every day, and people don’t realize that that quality of baseball is pretty important on that resume when you’re trying to sell. And I’ll just say for DuPont, you know, wow, y’all got that quality of baseball, because the batting league is probably the second oldest summer league, next to Cape Cod in America.
Gene Mundy 14:36
You bring up a good point quality of life. What makes Covington particularly well suited for young families, families that want to relocate or Boomerang, families that want to come back.
Allen Dressler 14:50
We’ll start with the quality of life of low crime. I mean, we’re certainly not immune to the problems of the world, but we. We do a very good job of managing that. We have a very good school system. Our kids get to meet friends and quality of learning. Housing. If I’m a young professional, I come back to Covington and my housing is not over top. I can invest in land and, you know, I’ve got this day and time, you know, from the internet to fiber to, you know, we, of course, we don’t have an Outback we don’t have a cracker bar. We, we understand that, and a lot of folks don’t understand the reason that we don’t have those things we could probably support one of the other on the weekend, but it’s not going to happen Sunday through Thursday, Friday, so, but if you want Cracker Barrel, if you want out back in 220 south and you have a nice dinner out with your significant other and have a Good time, but we do have very good restaurants. And I just I’m one of those people. I graduated from college, landed in Salem and wanted to come back home for all the right reasons. And again, here we are, 35 years later,
Gene Mundy 16:17
what is Alan dressler’s vision for Covington five years from now,
Allen Dressler 16:25
I want to see improvement, of course, in our economic development, in jobs that is critical. Once we and we’re working on it, we’re moving very well. We have the pad site down in low more that is a joint venture with the city and the county. And it may not be we are seeing interest, not just from folks in the industry in the United States, but European countries are looking at investing in America. I have high hope for the facility down there and improvements on our housing. You know, you and I both grew up in the Rivermont area, I hate to say, but you know, our housing up there is not what it was when we were a kid and and I do encourage people to take care of your property and keep your grass mowed, because we don’t know any given day who’s passing through 220 north, heading to the homestead for a weekend that thinks, honey, this could be a good place for us to be. So I see in five years, the improvements in the economy, jobs, and hopefully, with that being said, out back in Cracker Barrel, will show up. I don’t know where time will have me in five years, but I’ll certainly be on the front porch cheering it on.
Gene Mundy 17:52
So in closing, what is your message to get families businesses that want to relocate to the city of Covington.
Allen Dressler 18:07
First and foremost, we’re very welcoming. I understand that. You know, a lot of stores today will say, well, we’re not getting this traffic and we’re not getting that traffic. We’re in an age, of course, the Facebooks and the internet that we have got to do a better job of advertising ourselves through social media. It’s not all about our local newspaper as it was as you and I were kids growing up, I see a tremendous amount of opportunity still here for our young people. Again, we are aging and and I see and I’m working on some of that, housing for our aging folks is critical, and we have a facility that may very well be the answer to that. And with that being said, Mrs. Jones may have a nice brick ranch home, and she wants somebody else to mow grass and not have to worry about that, and now, all of a sudden, we have a house for sale that can accommodate husband, wife and a couple children. So all of those things play in together. I encourage our people to continue staying on the high road. Be positive about where you live. I can honestly say that when I go to different places and go to restaurants, I asked the question to my waiter or waitress, what do you think about the community you live in? What’s there to do here? And the common is there’s nothing to do here, and I can’t wait to leave. Never anything. It’s never anything good. And that’s from Roanoke to Gatlinburg, Tennessee. I mean, it just so again, if you want to be something, you can be anything in this world that you want to be, but you got to put an effort into being it. And I think thanks to city council, thanks to believing in. Our vision and the support that we’re getting, we can truly be something and something to be proud of.
