Best Downtown Revitalizer

Sean O'Byrne toiled for years selling commercial real estate downtown. The way he tells it, he spent most of that time trying to convince his clients they should move to the city's center while trying to distract them from the trashed-out streets, the crumbling sidewalks and the boarded-up buildings. So this spring, when a group of downtown business interests imposed fees on themselves to create a Downtown Community Improvement District, O'Byrne had a chance to do something about the problem he'd been dancing around for years. He took a pay cut to head up the new downtown CID, viewing it as community service. He went to work hiring a crew of cheerful, yellow-shirted downtown ambassadors to chat up pedestrians, help get rid of trash and generally keep their eye on things. He's also commanded the attention of City Hall, his weapon of choice being a camera. O'Byrne documents embarrassing examples of neglect (our favorite is the shot of the storm drain that hasn't been cleaned for so long that there's a healthy patch of sod growing out of it) and presents these ransom notes to City Manager Wayne Cauthen, who then gives his department heads a month to fix the problems. O'Byrne is straight-talking and charismatic and amped about downtown. When was the last time you could say that about anyone?