By DEBRA HAIGHT
BCR Correspondent
BUCHANAN, MI – After the resignation of three people over the last month, remaining Downtown Development Authority members met last week to discuss where they go from here in terms of recruiting new members, the DDA’s current status and their priorities for the future.
The DDA was reformed earlier this year after a five year hiatus and nine members were appointed to the board. Two members resigned in October while a third member resigned earlier this month. That left the DDA with just six members which is not enough to take official action.
Those who resigned in October were Rich Paniagua and Jeffrey Antisdel, while Shawn Renfro resigned earlier this month. Paniagua, who had been the DDA chairman, mentioned concerns about reconciling what he saw as the lack of aligned principles and support with his values.
For her part, Renfro, who was the DDA secretary, cited her business, Buchanan Craft LLC, requiring her full attention. “Furthermore, I have found the ongoing interpersonal challenges within the organization to be a significant concern, despite recent personnel changes,” she wrote.
Remaining DDA members are Julie Capron, Sidney Finan, Michael Reed, Fran Terry, Mayor Mark Weedon, and Joseph Williams.
At last week’s special meeting/work session, DDA members set Dec. 3 at 5 p.m. as the date to interview prospective new members in anticipation of making recommendations for the City Commission to act on at their Dec. 8 meeting.
City Clerk Kalla Langston-Weiss told members that she has received two applications from the city’s most recent call for applicants after the Paniagua and Antisdel resignations. She said she also plans to reach out to those who applied initially in the spring to see if they would still be interested in serving.
Last Wednesday’s meeting began with a presentation by Berrien County Community Development Director Dan Fette about the DDA’s purpose as well as his draft ideas about future plans. Fette has been working with the city on the tax increment financing plan being reinstated with the renewal of the DDA.
Fette reminded members of the DDA’s purpose as well as how the TIF plan works. “One big reason to have a DDA is to halt the deterioration of property values in the downtown,” he said. “The DDA does that through things like physical improvements, marketing, and anything that brings in business and economic activity.”
He noted that the city now has a better idea of the DDA’s finances than when he first talked to DDA members in the summer. The projected annual TIF revenue is expected to be around $112,000 and the DDA has over $400,000 in past reserves that the city has transferred back to the DDA now that it has been reconstituted.
Fette has developed a draft budget and plan and asked for members’ input before getting a final draft to the city next month. He said he based the budget and plan in part on what the DDA has historically done such as paying for the operation of the Common, Farmers Market, Pears Mill, and the Tin Shop Theatre.
He suggested that the DDA focus on spending much of the rest of their annual budget on marketing, event programming, and signage, rather than the façade improvements and business grants/loans which the DDA has done in the past.
He said if the DDA still wants to have a grant/loan program or conduct façade improvements, they could use some of the DDA reserve funds for that. Or conversely, he said they could free up part of the annual budget for a grant/loan program and use of the reserve funds to pay for signage or marketing.
He gave his own perspective as a north county resident on what he thinks the city has to offer. “What draws me down here is the Commons,” he said. “That’s probably the place where you can get the biggest bang for your buck instead of focusing on infrastructure.”
City Manager Tony McGhee said after the meeting that the city staff had sent out a prioritization poll to the DDA members so decisions on how to prioritize spending can be made at the board’s December meeting.
“From a broadbrush perspective, the emphasis will be on marketing and events, oversight and funding of the activities in the Commons they had under their umbrella before such as the Farmers Market and the Concert Series, as well as smaller to be identified capital improvement projects in the District,” McGhee said.
At least half of the nearly two-hour meeting was spent talking about what the DDA’s priorities should be, including what projects they should be working on moving forward. Mention was made not only of resurrecting long ago plans to make improvements to the Common as well as bringing back events like Thrill on the Hill.
Finan asked about the value of re-establishing the small business incubator the LiveBuchanan organization had organized a year or two ago and said she wasn’t willing to totally give up on the idea. Fette said that incubators can work but they need to be geared toward specific businesses.
She also questioned the framework of the proposed budget as currently drafted. “It seems like we’re maintaining what’s here and there’s not a lot of wriggle room to add new initiatives,” she said.
Fette said that the proposed budget is not cast in stone and can be adjusted to fit the priorities DDA members believe are important. “This has to be your plan, not mine; I’m here to facilitate,” he said. He added only that a DDA budget needs to be in place after the first of the year so that summer activities can be approved and funded.
When asked what they thought of Fette’s budget and plan proposals, Reed said he thought “everything’s right on”. “I don’t think the signage costs will be that high though,” he said. “I think it does make sense to get a list of priorities … The important thing is getting people back downtown, not to make money.”
In public comments at the close of the meeting, business owner Randy Hendrixson said the previous DDA’s master plan was very conceptual and told members not to pursue “rainbows and unicorns.” He suggested instead to pursue other past plans such as connecting Mill Alley to the Common and making it handicapped accessible.
He closed his comments with a plea for the DDA to spend its money wisely. “We worked hard for that $400,000, so be careful with it,” he said.