A new downtown Nanaimo business group plans to work to revitalize the city’s core and stage special events once pandemic restrictions ease, hopefully starting this fall.
Nanaimo council gave its approval this week for a new Downtown Business Improvement Area to be established.
Downtown property owners will be taxed when local government taxes are levied mid-year to raise a total of $150,000 in 2021 for the group to promote and represent the city centre.
The group will operate with a five-year term that can be renewed by council.
A virtual meeting is set for Tuesday to form an 11-member board, said Kim Smythe, chief executive of the Greater Nanaimo Chamber of Commerce. Smythe has been managing the initiative to get the group established and will serve for a year as board chairman.
The group aims to address everything from disruption and property crime caused by social issues such as addiction and homelessness — a major concern for downtown businesses — to developing a downtown brand and promoting Christmas shopping.
Plans depend on the success of the fight against COVID-19, with Smythe hopeful that there will be some relaxation of protocols by fall.
The goal is to attract more people downtown by putting on special activities once it is possible to do so, he said.
“I think as life in general will start to come back and people’s energy and spirits will be lifted by being able to socialize and leave their house,” he said. “People are going to see a change to downtown and as we come out of COVID, there will be more special events.”
The chamber has also been talking to the city’s parks and recreation department about the possibility of a winter festival offered close to downtown, Smythe said.
He sees the new organization as a unifying force that will create a bond between downtown merchants, business people and property owners. “So that they know that they’re speaking with one voice.”
Along with other B.C. communities, Nanaimo is dealing with the fallout from opioid addictions, a population of people without homes and with mental-health troubles. New supportive-housing facilities are opening in the city to help address the problems.
Council has also voted to spend $400,000 on downtown security.
A previous downtown business association folded in 2017 after city hall stopped paying a grant. The new group will be financially independent and will not receive municipal funds.
The initiative to create a new downtown business improvement area started prior to the pandemic. It has already been granted status by the province as a non-profit.
Signatures from at least half the owners of 138 downtown properties would have killed the plan, but only 22 per cent were opposed.
Owners opposed to the plan also had to hold at least 50 per cent of the value of land and improvements within the downtown area for it not to go ahead, but in this case, the opposition only represented 8.75 per cent of the total $181.8-million assessed value of those properties.
That result allowed council to approve the new bylaw.
