Downtown Could Benefit From Cleanup
On summer days in cities across the face of America, merchants used to come out on the sidewalks in the morning and uncoil garden hoses, one after another, block upon block.
Appearing almost as if on cue, they’d stand and gossip. Greet passersby. And spray off the concrete.
This refreshingly wholesome scene from a Norman Rockwell painting is still repeated daily in scattered smaller cities, especially in the South.
And it may be coming soon to Spokane.
It is one of numerous creative solutions being shaped by a task force which has charged itself with the daunting assignment of plucking downtown from the doldrums, and infusing new life.
The task force, which calls itself the Spokane Downtown Action Committee, has organized into subcommittees responsible for major overhauls in these areas:
Parking and transportation - a top issue with the general public.
Marketing and promotion of downtown - the No. 1 interest of merchants.
Recruiting new retail stores, service shops, offices, employers large and small - the lifeblood of downtowns.
Lobbying for downtown. Somebody has to do it.
And my favorite, “common areas” - cleanliness, security, beautification, signs, and so on.
To fund the effort, the task force is asking business and property owners to tax themselves.
A petition is being circulated to form a self-taxing district, much like an LID (local improvement district). A professional manager and staff will be hired to execute the strategies adopted by the task force and see to it that work of the district gets done for the common good.
As a result, downtown’s thousands of owners will finally be able to do things together for the benefit of all that they can’t do individually.
It’s a huge advantage enjoyed by corporations which own and manage malls. Ownership of the property rights entitle shopping malls to require individual tenants to help pay for common area upkeep and maintenance.
And malls can impose standards of acceptable behavior. But in downtowns abandoned by paying patrons, because of the inability to do these things, blight and decay are the legacy.
Now, getting back to cleaning the sidewalks - more readers of this column complain about filth than anything else. Even parking.
Why?
As task force member Karen Valvano observes, “You can have the best parking in the world, but if there’s nothing to come downtown for, who cares?”
Exactly.
David Tye of the Hines Interests, which owns and manages the SeaFirst Financial Center tower, chairs the Common Area Subcommittee.
He wants to make Spokane the cleanest city in America.
It’s getting better. The past year or so, instead of just locking up juvenile offenders, some have been put to work cleaning.
Tye’s group wants to expand and perfect that process. “It might even help teach them some respect,” he hazards.
We can always hope.
But shopkeepers could set a better example, too. Instead of tripping over dirt outside their doors, they could clear a path for customers, you’d think.
Furthermore, investing actual elbow grease in cleaning up downtown’s act might even help the image of merchants. In many minds, I suspect, such a sight could provide an inkling that retailers are at least capable of caring about something more than turning a fast buck.
Second in importance to cleaning the sidewalks, judging from the feedback I receive, is clearing out dangerous drug dealers, belligerent panhandlers, obstreperous street people.
Would readers crack down on scum? Take a guess.
Well, the task force is exploring with city officials ways of taking back the public sidewalks from those who spread fear and anger, anxiety and disgust.
One suggestion is a private security force - but who pays them any heed? Another is gun-toting off-duty cops. How about a mix?
But the idea I like best is another one pioneered by smaller cities. Lease out the sidewalks to property owners. Give downtowns the same rights malls have to enforce standards of conduct.
Tye said Spokane would probably be the largest community to try this to date. Well, time’s a wasting.