Call For Presenters: 2025 Illinois Main Street Statewide Conference
BE A PRESENTER AT THE 2025 ILLINOIS MAIN STREET CONFERENCE
The annual Illinois Main Street Statewide Conference is a two-day event celebrating historic Main Streets, downtown districts and neighborhood commercial areas essential to thriving communities. Powered by dedicated professionals, volunteers, and civic leaders, the conference aims to bring together leaders, advocates, and enthusiasts to learn from industry experts on how to grow and sustain downtown districts as hubs of economic and social opportunity.
The 2025 Illinois Main Street Statewide Conference will be November 12-14 in Dixon and will include general sessions, concurrent breakout sessions, informational tours, networking opportunities, and a collaborative project. The conference is brought to you by Illinois Main Street, in partnership with Illinois Lieutenant Governor Juliana Stratton, the Driehaus Foundation, and the Dixon Chamber of Commerce & Main Street.
Theme: From Ideas to Action—Collaborating for Impact
We’re excited to invite session proposals for this year’s conference. As communities everywhere reimagine the future of their downtowns, this year’s theme centers on the power of collaboration and the importance of turning bold ideas into real-world results.
We’re seeking session proposals that showcase innovative partnerships, grassroots efforts, public-private collaborations, and proven strategies that have moved the needle on downtown revitalization. Whether you’ve led a transformative streetscape project, activated underused spaces through creative placemaking, or built bridges between business owners, residents, and local government—your experience can inspire others to take action.
Join fellow changemakers, planners, business leaders, artists, and community advocates as we explore what’s possible when we work together to bring ideas to life.
We’re especially interested in sessions that explore topics such as:
Cross-sector partnerships that have driven transformation
Tactical urbanism and creative approaches to placemaking
Strategies for moving from planning to on-the-ground results
Inclusive engagement practices that foster equitable growth
Case studies, success stories, and lessons learned from real-world projects
Let’s turn vision into momentum—together. Submit your session proposal and help shape the future of our downtowns!
*Note that sessions are non-commercial. Presenters may not promote a product, service, or anything else representing monetary self-interest. Failure to comply will affect future consideration.*
SCOPE OF SERVICES
If you have a high-quality presentation that would be appropriate for downtown/Main Street district economic development professionals and volunteers, we urge you to consider submitting a session proposal. We are seeking a balance of beginner, intermediate and advanced educational breakout sessions one-hour in length, including Q & A. For a list of session ideas, view the final page of this document.
TIMELINE
April 15, 2025 - Proposal opportunity published online
May 30, 2025 - Proposals due by 7:00pm CST
June 9, 2025 - Notification of selection
August 4, 2025 - Registration opens
November 1, 2025 - Presentation materials due
November 12-14, 2025 - Illinois Main Street Statewide Conference in Dixon
COMPENSATION
Costs of preparation of the proposal are solely the responsibility of the applicant. The success of this conference is dependent on the expertise offered to attendees by volunteer presenters. Each presenter will receive one complimentary conference registration for each participating speaker.
APPLICATION INSTRUCTIONS
Please use the online application form to submit a session proposal at
All questions on the online form must be completed.
You will be asked to include bios and photos for all presenters.
PUBLIC INFORMATION
All submitted proposals may be treated as public record unless the applicant requests the information be treated as confidential in accordance with the public records laws of the State of Illinois at the time the proposal is submitted.
SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS
The applicant agrees:
Staff may copy the proposal for the purpose of facilitating the evaluation of the proposal or to respond to requests for public records and represents that such copying will not violate the rights of any third party.
It will not bring any claim or have any cause of action against the committee based on any misunderstanding concerning the information provided herein or concerning the failure, negligent or otherwise, to provide the applicant with pertinent information as intended by this “Call for Session Proposals.”
Please feel free to share this message if you've heard someone present at a conference or workshop that you feel would be a great addition to the Illinois Main Street State Conference schedule. For professional trainers and service providers, being selected as a workshop presenter should be considered an opportunity to connect with potential future clients.
EVALUATION
Proposals will be reviewed by the Illinois Main Street Statewide Conference Planning Committee, which will consider all information provided in the proposal when making selections and may consider relevant information from other sources.
Selections will be made using the following criteria (listed in no particular order):
Completeness of proposal submission
Relevancy of the presentation to the audience
The Illinois Main Street Statewide Conference Planning Committee reserves the right to utilize program staff, committee members and other professional contacts as trainers/facilitators for any session planned for the conference, with or without submission of a proposal at any time.
QUESTIONS
Contact Erik Reader, Director of Illinois Main Street by email at ereader@mainstreet.org.
TOPIC AREAS
Activating vacant or underutilized spaces
Adaptive reuse
Affordable housing
Architecture & design
Board governance
Business attraction
Business development & support
Community events
Collaboration/partnerships
Clean & safe programming
Cultural events & festivals
Design principles/process
Destination marketing
Economic development incentives
Entrepreneurship & startup business assistance
Farmers Markets
Financial management
Fundraising
Grant writing
Historic preservation
Human resources management
Inclusion & belonging
Infrastructure & public improvements
Implementation of ideas
Makers & manufacturing
Parking management strategy
Placemaking
Public art
Redevelopment projects & financing
Retail support
Social media & influencer marketing
Small scale incremental development
Sponsorship solicitation
Strategic planning
Storefront design
Storytelling
Technology
Tourism
Volunteer development & engagement