BOONEVILLE, Miss. (WTVA) -- Keith Vaughn is no stranger to business.
He is adding another restaurant to his lineup.
"This year we just made a decision to invest in the city again. We're excited about what's going on. The school is growing across the street from us. Looks like sales tax revenues are growing. We're glad to see that. It gives us more confidence," Vaughn said.
New businesses are opening up-especially around Wal-mart. New construction is sign of more to come.
With new business comes more tax revenue.
City officials say sales tax collections for the month of December soared to $183,000. That's $20,000 more than December, 2012.
While there continues to be a great deal of optimism about growth in Booneville, there are those who express concern that the downtown area could get lost in the shuffle.
Main Street Association Director Trudy Featherston doesn't worry so much about the downtown being forgotten, but she does say it could use some more attention.
"I would love to see our downtown area become more prosperous. We are in need of retail," Featherston said.
Those we found on a typical week day say they would love to see more variety.
"We've got McDonalds and we've got Wendys. We've got restaurants that you can go in and sit down and have a family meal, but I think our students would like to see a lot more variety," Crystal White said.
"There's too much fast food, so we need more restaurants and stores like clothing and stuff for better clothes," Kristen Aykens said.
"We need some more industry and jobs just like every small town, but we have that hometown feeling that you can't get anywhere else," Judy George said.
That hometown feeling is what Featherston plans to preserve and use to attract more investment to downtown.
She says that will also help to increase sales tax revenue.
