YOUNGSTOWN — It doesn’t take much effort to sense spring is in the air: Birds are chirping more abundantly, most lawns are becoming greener, many trees are budding and the temperature is steadily climbing.

Another sign of winter’s end and spring’s birth is Youngstown CityScape making known its blueprint for the year.

“Any of our supporters will tell you it’s about more than plants. Beautifying Youngstown is about aesthetics, the arts and amenities and, most of all, forming community partnerships,” Sharon Letson, CityScape’s executive director, said during a news conference and kickoff breakfast Thursday morning at the agency’s offices, 250 E. Federal St., downtown.

She also noted that the agency is planning to host the 28th annual Streetscape gathering, set for 9 a.m. to noon May 31 in and around the downtown corridor. The project will entail mainly planting flowers as well as mulching and removing weeds from flower beds and other areas.

Letson noted that CityScape’s most impactful project last year was CityScape at Briel’s, the former greenhouse at 23 S. Belle Vista Ave. on the West Side that the downtown beautification organization bought in mid-2021 for $145,000.

Briel’s Flowers & Greenhouse, which opened in 1924, closed Dec. 31, 2019, after having been in business nearly 96 years. It had been the city’s last standing full-service greenhouse.

Specifically, the former greenhouse is being converted to a place to house a neighborhood resource garden center for CityScape and other nonprofit entities. Nevertheless, the work also is extending beyond the building’s walls, Letson said.

“It’s helping to drive the revitalization of the Garden District and the Mahoning Avenue corridor,” she explained, adding that CityScape at Briel’s also will provide a space for gardeners, along with supplies and educational components.

The project should wrap up this year, Letson noted.

Preparatory work has been underway in advance of this year’s Streetscape work, she said. Letson added that an estimated 1,000 children and adults volunteered in last year’s beautification effort along Central Square and in many city neighborhoods.

In his remarks, Mayor Jamael Tito Brown echoed Letson’s assessment of the importance of forming collaborations for the city’s betterment. He contrasted the value and malleability of partnerships with the limited usefulness of woodchips and metal chips, saying the first two eventually rot and rust, respectively, but partnerships tend to endure.

Brown added that when he’s out of town, he proudly tells others that the city’s beautification is the result of a community coming together to work together.

Germaine Bennett, Youngstown CityScape’s board president, said that many people who visit the Mahoning Valley from elsewhere drive through the downtown corridor and observe what is going on in the area. They also use such assessments to judge whether the city is thriving, she added.