YOUNGSTOWN — With businesses in downtown Youngstown experiencing difficulties, particularly because of the Realty Tower explosion and subsequent demolition, the city and its partners scheduled The Open, an Oct. 19 event to bring people back.

“We all have to do our part to ensure the success of our downtown,” said Mayor Jamael Tito Brown at a Tuesday news conference.

The Open event — called that because downtown is open again — is free, with numerous bands performing throughout the day. All of the food and beverages will be sold by downtown businesses.

“We’re repairing, we’re restoring, but we’ve got to rebuild our downtown Youngstown,” Brown said.

A May 28 gas explosion caused extensive damage to the 13-story Realty Tower in Central Square. Demolition of the building started July 12 and all of the debris could be removed as soon as today.

After the explosion, several downtown streets and buildings were closed, and some won’t reopen until November.

Before that, downtown establishments saw business declines because of the closing of several streets for a major improvement project for the past couple of years. That started shortly after downtown — and the rest of the country — experienced financial problems during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Now downtown is open, we are open for business and this is a time where we’ll be celebrating downtown,” said Councilman Julius Oliver, D-1st Ward. His ward includes downtown.

The stage will be set up on North Phelps Street at the corner of West Federal Street.

Food and beverages will be sold with people being able to walk around downtown with them on North Phelps from West Federal to West Commerce streets and on West Federal Street from Wick Avenue to Hazel Street.

Four bands will perform, headlined by Red Wanting Blue, which will take the stage at 9:45 p.m.

“We wanted to create an event that directly benefits the downtown businesses,” said Eric Ryan, president of JAC Management Group, which runs the Covelli Centre, Wean Park and Youngstown Foundation Amphitheatre for the city.

“We want it to benefit the downtown businesses,” Ryan said. “The downtown businesses, restaurants and bars will be the only ones serving the food and beverages.”

Brown said this is the first of what he expects will be a series of events to help downtown. While he couldn’t provide specifics, Brown said events like the Family Oktoberfest on Phelps Street on Sept. 21, the downtown Ghost Tour on Oct. 3 and 4, and the annual holiday parade in December bring many people downtown.

REALTY WORK

Meanwhile, the debris from the Realty Tower should be removed by today or Thursday, said Gary Moderalli, owner of Moderalli Excavating, the building’s demolition contractor.

After that, the remaining four flights of stairs will be taken down, he said.

The plan after the debris and the stairs are removed is to fill the spot where the building sat with dirt and then gravel to make it a temporary parking lot.

The company has spent the past week removing debris from the site.

The May 28 gas explosion caused significant damage to Realty Tower on East Federal Street. The blast killed Akil Drake, who worked at the Chase Bank on the building’s ground floor, and injured nine others. Building owner YO Properties 47 LLC decided June 17 to demolish the downtown structure and Moderalli began that work July 12.

The initial deadline to demolish all but four floors was Aug. 5.

The entire project initially was projected to take about six weeks. It’s been more than eight weeks.

Moderalli said the building proved to be a challenge to demolish and he wanted it down as safely and quickly as possible.