PROCTOR—Municipal leaders want people to know Proctor is open for business — and they’ll be spreading that message Saturday during the Vermont Marble Museum’s grand reopening and townwide celebration.

The Proctor Prosperity Plan has been designed to stimulate economic and smart growth in the community, said Dick Horner, Planning Commission chairman. The majority of improvements are slated to be completed within five years.

Bill Champine, Select Board chairman, said the town applied for grants through the Rutland Regional Planning Commission and awarded the planning design to Bread Loaf Construction.

“They’ve done a fine job,” Champine said of Bread Loaf’s work to plan the city’s future. “This town needs to bring business back.”

To bolster business tax advantages, Proctor is pursuing a municipal re-designation to village status, Horner said, saying that re-designation could spur business growth.

Town officials say they’re investigating what types of businesses residents and tourists would want to see. And incoming grant money will be put toward preservation of historical sites downtown that the town wants to use for commercial and business offices.

“Part of the thrust is to determine the types of businesses people would like to see here,” said Stan Wilbur, town administrator. “Right now, people go out of town for everything.” So far he’s identified the need for a bank, restaurant and convenience store.

The opening of the Vermont Marble Museum is one of two major projects driving the revitalization of Proctor, Wilbur reported. The renovations to the museum include redevelopment of the building’s lower floor into mixed industrial, office and retail space.

Wilbur said the museum’s capital improvements will cost about $800,000 but will be a face lift for the entire town, he said.

The other major component of the town plan, Wilbur said, is the addition of a College of St. Joseph extension that would bring a physician’s assistant course to the town’s downtown center.

“If you bring 50 to 100 students in, you need services — places to buy coffee and doughnuts,” Wilbur said.

Wilbur said the construction of two new almost identical buildings on an empty 6-acre parcel of land on Main Street will bring the opportunity for business development and downtown living.

The bottom floor of the mixed-use buildings with commercial space for businesses such as banks and convenience stores, Wilbur said, with the two top levels for small apartment units. He said the development will be intended to strengthen the north end of Main Street. But first, the site has to be cleaned up and is estimated to take five or more years before completion.

“The two buildings will fill a hole on the streetscape downtown,” Wilbur reported.

The new plan calls for a railway place holder should Amtrak extend train service from Rutland to Burlington.

For new attractions, Wilbur said a walking path to the Sutherland Falls — the highest waterfall in Vermont — could incorporate walking paths and outlooks from the east side of the river. A bike path would connect the skating rink, Village Green, Beaver Pond and the town forest to help increase activity in the town center.

The decline of Proctor began during the last century, Wilbur said. But in 1914, the owners of Vermont Marble Co. — the Proctor family — were still paying 66 percent of sales taxes around the town. At its peak, Vermont Marble’s 5,000 workers accounted for most of Proctor’s population.

By midcentury, the marble trade had slowed and many quarries were shut down. Proctor’s population had dropped to around 2,000, where it has hovered ever since.

In 1976, Vermont Marble was purchased by Omya, which moved about 50 high-paying jobs out of state in 2008. Wilbur said about a dozen employees remain.

The former Omya lab building will be split between College of St. Joseph and the town. CSJ will gain the rear of the building and the building’s front end will become the new town offices. The college will gain another classroom building farther east down Main Street.

Champine said Proctor has never seen such a big push for revitalization. But he’s happy to see it, he said.

He said within five years, he expects the town will have started to cultivate a strong small-business economy.

“It will help Proctor a lot,” he said.