Mayoral Musings: Vacancy Ordinance Round 3

As we enter the spring months, I am always encouraged and energized by how our community starts to come out of its winter slumber and re-emerge excited for warmer months filled with community events, nights out with friends, fireworks, and dining outside. With that excitement and energy comes a renewed energy and urgency around further improving and advancing efforts to fill vacant spaces in our business and downtown spaces.

As many of you have read over the years, it has been my belief that in order to improve our downtown, we must commit ourselves to being an active participant in the improvement of the area. Historically, our community has taken a very "carrot-first” approach, by that I mean committing taxpayer money that supports the development of a positive business environment that, in turn, would draw in potential businesses to the borough. Some examples include:

·A downtown business consultant in Stephen Barth who helps identify and nourish potential developers and business owners.

·Investment in Discover Lansdale who creates, manages, and promotes events throughout the year bringing in thousands of people to our community and our stores.

·Façade improvement grants that provide business owners the opportunity to improve their signage and entryways.

·Sale of property (like the Madison Street Parking lot) and support/tax abatement of land development (like Luxor) to encourage projects that are geared toward millennials and young professionals with disposable incomes.

·The dedication of an Economic Development Committee that helps explore new avenues and approaches to commercial success in the borough.

All of which is important, needed, and effective!

Our community has grown significantly over the last decade, our average age has decreased compared to the state average, our average income is above the state average, and the value of property in the borough has increased dramatically. All positive and critical signals to business developers looking to build a successful venture.

And yet, I can name no less than 10 vacant commercial spaces between Broad and Cannon. Spaces with, objectively, clear access to our busiest parts of town with successful restaurants and businesses (some of which are related to the efforts listed above) that would be adjacent to them. Success begets success, right?

If the market conditions are right (and they are), why are these buildings still empty?

As I have called for in years’ past, it is time to revisit our model of economic development. The "carrots” we have offered historically have worked, but the property owners who remain with empty spaces have either neglected their property (making it difficult to lease or sell) or may not be fully engaged in leasing the property. Neither is productive and both hold back an otherwise successful attempt at community redevelopment. If neither is true, then we need to better understand why their building is struggling to be leased to see if there is a way we can aid them.

Either way, we need to create a system that allows everyone to have more insight and investment into our community so that allof Lansdale can continue our journey forward and portions of it are not being left behind to remain empty leaving residents perpetually asking, "why can’t something be done there?!”

To be clear, I think that we should not just offer incentives for vacant property owners to use their spaces, but also create a vacancy ordinance that demands their participation after some time and motivates them to invest in the buildings they own or pay a fine that we can use to boost our economic development and create more incentives to help the whole community deal with the image of long-term vacant spaces.

The arguments against the above suggestion span from the minute (how would define the parameters?) to the grandiose (this isn’t necessary, market economics will manage this, and it isn’t the government’s place anyway.) and everything in between.

The truth of the matter is that if intervention wasn’t necessary, and everything is as it should be, then why are there extended vacancies in town? A vacant building for a year, maybe even three years, happens and is a normal development in any downtown community. But some are going on for 10 years or more. These are not the product of "times are tough” arguments. They are purposed or unmanaged and that, in my opinion, is untenable.

Invention is necessary because the market is notoperating in the way it should. We have done the hard work of building a business environment that is prime for almost any and every style of business. It is past time we develop a higher expectation of commercial property ownership in Lansdale and that begins with creating a vacancy ordinance that both supports re-development/improvement while establishing fines for extended periods of vacancy to ensure there is revenue to help sustain other business development efforts.