DBIA Back in Business
By 250 News
Monday, March 01, 2010 08:53 PM
Prince George, B.C. - The DBIA is back in business.
Despite a pitch that called on Council to hold off, or put more meat on the bones of the DBIA’s spending plan, Council voted in favour of the fourth and final reading of the bylaw which establishes the special levy.
The levy means that some property owners having to pay as much as $10 thousand extra dollars on the taxes this year.
The United Steelworkers Local 1-424 Financial Secretary, Brian O’Rourke says the meeting this evening had an air of the issue being a done deal. “The only thing that would have even been more ludicrous is if they had passed the fourth reading before we made our presentation” says O’Rourke.
The Steelworkers say the new Downtown Business Improvement levy, will cost them $6,000 a year, that’s a lot of money when the membership dues are down because of job losses in the forest sector. The Steelworkers also question the boundaries, saying their building is the furthest from the downtown core and others, which might be more suited to inclusion, like the radio and T.V. station or the Native Friendship Centre across the street, are not included. O’Rourke wouldn’t rule out the Union selling the building a moving elsewhere “Anything is possible at this given time, but like I say, hanging some more flower baskets does nothing for the downtown core, or for us where we are located. We are firm believers of the Clean and Safe program, but this shouldn’t be just downtown businesses to be involved in that. I think every business in Prince George would be willing to put some dollars towards a clean and safe program.”
The Steelworkers were part of a group which called upon Council to either hold off on establishing a DBIA levy, or, at the very least, request a detailed financial business plan from the DBIA.
Myrt Turner of Turner and Associates says the business plan presented for the use of the dollars raised is inadequate. “There is only one item on the plan that is measurable, that is flower baskets, you either hang them, or you don’t, the results are visual” She questions the goals and accountability of the DBIA. “When I served on the Gateway Business Association they advised to focus on bricks and mortar and they had it right” She asked Council to request that the DBIA present a detailed budget on how each dollar will be spent before any money is to be delivered to it. “You don’t solve a problem by throwing money at it.”
Kelli Steer, General Manager of the Coast Inn of the North started with stating the Coast Inn is not against a DBIA, but there must be a better way of doing things. She pointed out that the Business plan for the Prince George DBIA would have more than half of the budget spent on administrative costs “ In Nanaimo, the administrative costs are held at 15%. In Kelowna, which is a new DBIA, the administration costs are held at 20% and in Chilliwack, it is written in their bylaw that administrative costs will not exceed 30%.”
Roger Cruezot of Gold’s Gym also called upon Council to request a detailed spending plan. He reminded Council that while the DBIA had been in existence for several years, there was no data to indicate that any of their previous programs have had any success and without measureable there is no way to conclude if any of the planned projects would have any impact. He says the Gymn will have to sell an extra 100 memberships just to cover the costs of tax levy.
The bylaw includes a provision for Council to have to approve the DBIA’s budget, at least on the business promotion plans.
While the Councillors expressed an appreciation for the group being factual and succinct in their presentation, there was little offered in the way of support to holding back on fourth reading of the bylaw, or extra conditions that would call on the DBIA to provide some detail of the benefits of any programs they had initiated.
The pitch came about half an hour before the request for the final reading of the bylaw came up for Council’s consideration.
Councilor Brian Skakun says he has spoken with a lot of Business owners, and they have told him, they are being taxed for nothing, as they will not benefit from the money being collected or spent. Some told him they already pay enough in taxes and downtown should be clean and safe already, others indicate increased taxes will kill their business. “It’s an unfair tax at the wrong time” says Skakun.
Councilor Garth Frizzell says this will cost his business directly and he will be supporting it “I’m putting my money where my mouth is on this one, and I will be paying for it.”
Councillor Murry Krause says he has given this a lot of thought and looking at a variety of perspectives on what to do with the downtown core. “I am going to support this reading. We have to get on with doing something with our downtown core, or we will not make the progress we need to make in a timely way.”
Councilor Sherri Greene supports the final reading, “I think they’ve (DBIA) done some really hard work to get to where they need to be . Because the DBIA has fought so diligently and advocated for a better downtown we are seeing a lot of good things coming that are the result of a lot of poking and prodding by the DBIA.”
Councillor Don Bassermann, indicated that as a Council they have made their priorities clear and downtown revitalization is on that list. “This is another building block in our view” He says the process (reverse petition) is a democratic process and while some may not like it, it is a fair process.
Councilor Stolz says for whatever reason there is a disconnect between the DBIA here and a small core group of opposition, although DBIA’s are successful in other communities in the Province.
Mayor Dan Rogers says he thinks this is the right way to go.
Councillor Brian Skakun was the lone dissenter on the final vote, Councilor Debora Munoz was absent.
Council has also requested a detailed budget be submitted by June 15th.
Last week it was announced those against the proposal had failed to reach the necessary threshold to stop the special levy.
Petitions against the special levy were received from 124 property owners, representing properties with an assessed value of $48,750,800. The levy could only be stopped if there was opposition from at least 243 property owners representing an assessed value of no less than $80,214, 101.
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Posted on Monday, March 01, 2010 08:53 PM in
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Posted by: verballabel on March 1 2010 9:13 PM