Overlay hard sell leaves doubts
Sharon McLeay
Times Contributor
A downtown overlay presentation given to business and building owners on May 23 at the Legion led to more questions and concerns than support.
Business owners discussed the existing decline of business, the lack of financial incentives to buy into the plan and questioned the Town’s degree of commitment to the program.
“l would like to see the town rev up its participation. The overlay is great, but forcing them to do renovations is the issue. Honestly, some of the businesses downtown are dumps,” said one audience member. “If I was going to move my business to town, I would preferentially pick the place that looked good. I couldn’t care less how cheap the rent is, if the building is a dump or looks run down, I wouldn’t take it. That is just the way it is.”
Business owner Sheila Crispin said there were efforts to beautify the downtown in the past and not all businesses complied.
“Some of these buildings are left vacant because they cannot get tenants, but they should still have a better responsibility of maintaining these buildings. Pick up the garbage. Sweep the sidewalk. Pull the weeds. In some of these buildings, no one is made to do that. The town has to fit their bylaws so the people have to do that. We ought to start small and get some of the little stuff organized first,” said Crispin.
Councillor Pat Fule agreed that building owners need to upkeep empty properties and town officers should checking and enforcing compliance. He also said it would be good for the Town to find out why so many of the buildings were empty.
“In the last two years, I have bought six retail places and in the last six months four have gone. They have all gone to the highway. How do I get these back? Reduce my rents? I need that to cover my costs,” said another business owner
There was discussion that some people move businesses to home bases because of high rent. The lack of adequate parking and ticketing was brought up. Comments from the floor directed blame at council for approving the development of shopping malls, leading to the empty commercial spaces. Owners didn’t want to commit to the plan, when their stores were empty and there was still empty space in the newer commercial areas too. Some questioned why bylaws did not restrict commercial development.
Councillor Bob Sobol suggested the empty buildings present a wise business investment now.
“Get in on the ground floor. Start by fixing things up and you will get renters. Stop competing with Walmart. You need unique buildings for the downtown area. It is not going to happen overnight. We can’t wave a magic wand and fill these buildings up. We have to set the infrastructure and the setting so we can attract people. We have to do that with density,” said Sobol.
“If someone owns a piece of property, and they come in and comply with everything, it moves to the rezoning. We have a public hearing and when the bylaw passes, it is a permitted use. We have to work with it, we (have) no choice,” said Nelson.
However, council can deny a downtown property owner’s request for variations in developing extra space vertically or horizontally, because it isn’t included in the existing bylaw. Sobol said the overlay could help modify the existing bylaw.
Some resented that if the overlay bylaw passed, it would enforce upgrades to frontages.
“Are you asking us, or are you telling us you are going to implement the overlay and when will this go into effect?,” asked Debbie Mitzner.
Any redevelopment or new development would have to comply with the bylaw and it is targeted to be in place by the end of the summer. Many felt it didn’t make sense and would place unnecessary burdens on business owners. Others thought grandfathered businesses would have no incentive to comply with the plan. They wanted to know if any grants or tax breaks would be given. Some owners jested tax breaks happen automatically when the buildings are run down. You don’t do upgrades, the assessments are lower and you have lower taxes.
It was stated the town would only be responsible for the infrastructure of the plan. Business owners wanted to know what else Town would contribute.
“Let’s assume this all happens. Is it the town objective, to redo sidewalk and paving stones? Will the town start to invest some of those dollars right a way to excite people… basically lead the way? You are enforcing this on business owners and saying, well we will do our part whenever it is needed. How can we convince business owners to invest their dollars, if the town is not committed to invest theirs? Is the town budgeting for this? I would expect to see those crosswalks in,” said John Gauvin.
Suggestions from the floor were that the Town could subsidize the improvements by making low interest loans available, amortized over 20 years. They could offer incentives through significant tax breaks for participation, place highway signage directing people to downtown, allow creative building use, and develop interesting attractions to draw people in, contact businesses giving them incentives to move to downtown Strathmore. It was stated that elected officials and staff were paid by taxpayers and they had a duty to assist businesses by bringing new growth to the Town.
“I’m not sure we can give tax breaks down here and not give them to businesses slightly further away from the overlay. Lower the tax for the downtown core and it really sets a precedent,” said Fule.
“I don’t know that we want to get involved to specifically put businesses in, I don’t think that is government’s job, we have to worry about the setting. Hopefully people will do the research to see if their business will work in an area. Unless we get council’s approval on any project, money is not going to be spent. Council is not going to approve it just because a couple people want tax breaks. There has to be a method to this, there has to be something to show that we are moving forward in a direction to bring people back. This is step one, just an initial small step in us moving forward. I just want to see us moving forward,” said Sobol.
“We have made changes in the past because citizens were upset. Everything is on the table. We have to find ways to get people to live and work downtown. We have lost bigger businesses from the downtown and I am worried that there are more to follow,” said Fule, who was hopeful that solutions could be reached.
Fule is attending a conference on town revitalizations and is looking for more information to contribute to this process.
“There is nothing off the table. Everything is possible and everything can be looked at. Myself, as a councillor, I want to see a downtown area that is a destination. I want to see people from Cochrane coming in to see our downtown. Obviously, we hope to have a council that will support downtown revitalization. It is getting worse by the day. I think we can turn that around,” said Sobol.
Anyone with support for the overlay or suggestions to improve it, can contact Nelson at the Strathmore Town office 403 934-3133 LindaN@strathmore.ca