Kirk Heinrichs (2013-03-03)1
Daniel Fama
From:Kirk Heinrichs <kheinrichs@att.net>
Sent:Sunday, March 3, 2013 12:39 PM
To:Paul Kermoyan
Cc:Daniel Fama
Subject:study session
Paul/Daniel,
Nice job on the report. This is an interesting and touchy issue. And while I agree with your assessment that the
timing is right, I don't know what the answer is. Retail has always been a tough sell (no pun intended)
downtown and the success of restaurants is clearly snowballing. It's always a tough decision when a City is
proposing to insert itself into the free marketplace. I can see some property owners having concerns about
further restricting their ability to lease space, especially when there are already ground floor restrictions against
office and service uses. It's a tough call. I like the idea of requiring a CUP to convert anymore space to
restaurant.
I do offer a suggestion to help with the "institutional knowledge" part of this. If the opportunity presents itself at
the study session, it might be helpful for the Council to understand from an historical perspective how we got to
this point. In the City's initial revitalization efforts, it was the zoning code amendments in the early 1990's put in
place to ensure the revitalization of the downtown was in tune with the goals and objectives of the City to
develop the downtown as a retail destination that is active both day and night. In the 1980s and early 1990's
when the office market was strong, downtown space was dominated by office uses and "8 to 5" service uses
creating an uninteresting street scape and environment. New policies were put in place intentionally to reverse
that trend. Those policies include parking exceptions for restaurants, allow, by right, restaurants serving only
B&W and closing at 11PM, and restricting new office and service uses on the ground floor. These policies
worked laying the foundation for the success of the downtown we have today. These Council members may not
know or understand why or when those polices exist. It might help frame the issue for them.
Good luck,
Kirk