“Eric Doden had some advice, the type he couldn’t share in front of a reporter. Doden spent the early part of his campaign for governor visiting communities in all 92 counties — a lot of them small towns just like 11,000-person Danville. And on this cold December day, local leaders picked Doden’s brain about how to redevelop the city’s aptly named Main Street as they showed off their downtown.
A local business owner was willing to unload his historic building only for a high price, but Doden had some strategies to get around that. If there’s something Doden knows, it’s how to break through barriers to redevelopment using whatever tactics he can, even if it means making some enemies.
“I’m a conservative, but we want ideas that bring people together,” Doden said. “We can sit here and debate all day long, and I’m not really going to convince, generally speaking, somebody that’s on the other side, but we can find policies that we all can agree to.”
