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THE BIRMINGHAM BUZZ
"It's the 2016 Plan, stupid."
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Buzz # 36 -- Jan. 21, 2003

Promoting intelligence and reason in city government. Our mission: To inform and involve all Birmingham citizens.

VISIT OUR WEBSITE at http://www.bhambuzz.org for:
-- Up-to-date news items
-- Resources such as the 2016 Plan.
-- A lively and (usually) intelligent discussion group

We want to hear from you! Please send questions, suggestions and feedback to info@bhambuzz.org
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In this (new! improved! shorter!) edition:

1) PSD member seeks input from residents
2) Opinion: PSD foe should bone up on facts then take a position that makes some sense
3) Stores seek to recapture excitement
4) What a way to spend a Saturday!
5) To be removed, send mail to info@bhambuzz.org


1) PSD member seeks input from residents

Jan. 21, 2003

As one of two resident members of the PSD board, my role is to voice resident concerns, desires and thoughts to this group. I want to fulfill my duty better with your help. I welcome any thoughts or concerns you would like heard. I also serve on the Maintenance/Capital Improvements subcommittee. We are responsible for holiday decorations, snow removal, flower and beautification programs.

I truly believe the PSD board has an important role in the management and viability of our vibrant downtown and look forward to your input to make it even more responsive.

Bob Waun
967 Southfield
Birmingham
robert.g.waun@wellsfargo.com
(248) 722-9286


2) Opinion: PSD foe should bone up on facts then take a position that makes some sense

Jan. 18, 2003

How credible are the people attacking the Principal Shopping District? Do they know what they're talking about? Does their position make any sense at all?
In a recent letter to the editor of the Eccentric (also published in the Buzz), Birmingham resident Ralph Seger asked, "What is the Principal Shopping District (PSD) doing to bring a profitable business into Adams Square where Farmer Jack gave up quite some time ago?"

He went on to say, "I think the PSD needs to be completely revamped and be judged on accomplishments, not how many people they can pack into a City Commission room where their future is questioned."

Seger, who is among those pulling City Commissioner Don Carney's strings to attack the PSD, is treasurer of the Presidents Council of Homeowners Associations. The council and its whacko leader, Paul Marion Reagan, have a history of grandiosely and ridiculously claiming to represent thousands of Birmingham residents who have never heard of them. Seger stacks the deck on the council for the Quarton Lake Estates homeowners association, which somehow merits two positions, when all other homeowners associations merit only one.

Carney, of course, is the commissioner from Quarton Lake who advocated an ethics code for city officials while skipping out on a lease for the downtown storefront occupied by his family business.

First, Seger needs to bone up on the facts.

Fact: Adams Square isn't even in the PSD, which ends on the west side of Adams.

Fact: Farmer Jack has seven years left on its lease, and unlike Carney, it hasn't skipped out. Having opened a new store less than a mile away at Maple and Coolidge, it won't allow another food store to occupy the Adams Square space.

Fact: As much as we all might appreciate Rite-Aid and Maskill's, many big national retailers don't, and so shy away from the location.

Fact: Even though it is outside the district, the PSD has been trying to recruit a tenant since last summer, and lists the space its website at http://www.enjoybirmingham.com.

Once he's got his facts straight, he might consider taking a logical position.

Both Carney and Seger have been opposed to new development downtown. But now they're calling for "effectiveness" and "accomplishments" from the PSD? Wouldn't that almost by definition mean more downtown development?

If this is the kind of intelligence and reason we get from our leaders, isn't it time for a change?


3) Stores seek to recapture excitement

Jan. 18, 2003

>From the Birmingham Eccentric

By Larry Ruehlen

Night or day -- Birmingham merchants are weighing which hours are best for special shopping events.

A group of merchants met Wednesday at The Community House to consider ways to recapture the old Night on the Town shopping excitement.

That event used to provide as much as 10 percent of annual sales for some merchants. Shoppers came from all around to get deals and merchants fondly remember the days when scores of women competed for the right to buy Victoria Secret Wonder Bras at deep discount prices. The sale lasted six hours and downtown streets were closed to traffic on a summer Friday night.

"It was so crowded back then you couldn't move," said Christine Winans, director of the Birmingham Bloomfield Chamber. "It was exciting downtown."
So exciting, in fact, that other communities latched on to Birmingham's midnight madness sales approach. Birmingham's annual feeding frenzy fizzled as fewer people trekked downtown every year.

The city's Principal Shopping District reinvented the sale by extending it to 12 hours and holding it on an entire Saturday. Day on the Town started as a family event. Sneaker-wearing shoppers pushed strollers while looking for deals and some merchants said the switch was a boon to their business. Toy and home stores sold more goods, but results were less than stellar in other shops.

Sweltering heat, the closing of Jacobson's department store and other retail vacancies downtown cast a pall on last year's Day on the Town. Now retailers like Robert Littman are looking for answers.

"We are like a kid who has $5 million because his father left him $20 million," Littman said. "We had wonderful, good old days, but they are gone. Day on the Town gave us a last shot. I was up to 3 a.m. the last two days thinking about this. We can't keep looking back. We can't give up on Day on the Town. Admittedly, it's a half-ass event, but it's better than nothing."

Littman, owner of Adventures in Toys, was one of some 20 merchants who attended a morning study session Wednesday. Another group of retailers met in the evening to talk about recapturing the sizzle in downtown Birmingham's biggest sale of the year. With the retail market in decline and no sign that a department store will come to the city, the discussion is not trivial.

"There was a degree of enthusiasm with a shorter time span," said Peter Sobelton, of Churchill's Cigar Shop. "If you spread the sale out over a long time, the people who can't get there in the first two hours say forget it, because all the good deals are gone."

John Heiney, director of the city's PSD, ran the discussion and a common theme soon emerged -- bring everyone and everything closer together to get the excitement back. Merchants on the fringe of town should sell goods on tables in front of empty store fronts. Entertainment stages should be closer together and none should be located too far from the Maple/Old Woodward shopping hub.

"I use the example of Las Vegas," said Dale Maple, owner of Hansel 'N' Gretel. "When you are on the strip, it's casino after casino and the energy is there. When you get a
gap where there is construction or something, the energy dies."

The need to recruit more restaurants was mentioned and PSD members said they would form a committee to go door-to-door if need be.

A quick show of hands demonstrated that merchants, at least those of whom attended the morning talk, supported going back to a night event by a 2-1 majority. The final decision will be made in the first week of February, Heiney said, as well as the actual date for the sale.

Birmingham City Commissioner Dianne McKeon attended the talk.

"I am really impressed with the cooperation that went on here," she said. "Whether it's a day or night event, I'm sure it will be a success."


4) What a way to spend a Saturday!

Join the City Commission, city staff and observers from the Buzz and elsewhere in the warm and cozy basement of Baldwin Library Saturday, Jan. 25, for the annual long-range planning session.

The all-day catered affair will feature updates on many important projects.

Expect fireworks over the Principal Shopping District, and a long-awaited presentation on Andres Duany's ideas for Shain Park.

The City has posted the agenda for the meeting. It includes a report from the PSD and a Duany sketch of an improved Shain Park. You can read or download the agenda at http://ci.birmingham.mi.us/AgendasMinutes/Commission/Agenda/2003/commagenda03.pdf.

5) To be removed, send mail to info@bhambuzz.org

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