Nanaimo’s Old City Quarter is in the process of potentially re-establishing and expanding its business improvement area.
An Old City Quarter business improvement area bylaw passed three readings at a council meeting on Monday, Feb. 7, which means the bylaw will go to a petition-against process.
The city was approached by the Old City Quarter Association in 2021 to re-establish a business improvement area, which has been operating since 2017, but the bylaw establishing it ended Dec. 31.
In a letter to the mayor and council, Matthew Rosenthal, association president, laid out the benefits of BIA funding for the business community, which included providing a venue for family events at Easter, Halloween and special decor for Christmas shopping season.
The association also provided marketing and branding for business area and merchants through social media and print and radio advertising, and Rosenthal the OCQA’s efforts helped draw trade from downtown Nanaimo.
He also mentioned working relationships and projects built to support OCQ members by working with the city to improve security and resources to help businesses cope with vagrancy and vandalism in the area. Several businesses on Milton Street, he said, had expressed interest in joining the OCQA to benefit from its affiliations and marketing and asked for an increase to the BIA funding boundary to include Milton and Prideaux streets.
“[City] staff have worked with the Old City Quarter Association to draft up the bylaw … as well as the petition against petition package as well as all the required advertising,” said Laura Mercer, city finance director in her report to council.
The extension to the Old City Quarter map would add 22 properties on Prideaux and Milton streets to the BIA for a total of 87 properties that can be levied for funds. The BIA bylaw is established for a five-year term and the 2022 levy is $50,000, which is comprised of a fixed fee of $270.72 per property plus a variable per property fee, based on the assessed value over $275,000. The variable fee is capped at a maximum $6,497.15.
The $50,000 levy will be increased by 2.5 per cent per year for the term of the bylaw.
There are no matching grants from the city.
The petition-against package will be sent to all business class properties within the Old City Quarter BIA. Property owners who do not want the levy must fill out, sign and submit the petition-against form.
“[For the BIA] to be successful, this petition must be properly signed by less than the majority of the owners representing at least one half of the value of the parcels – that’s land and improvement assessed value – which are liable to be specifically charged within that area,” Mercer said.
The deadline for petition-against submission is March 25.
Coun. Sheryl Armstrong was the only council member voting in opposition.
“I’ll be voting opposed to this because, as I’ve always done, I don’t believe in petition against. I believe in a position for,” she said.
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