VIDEO: business owners call on city to save the Downtown Mall
Some say regulation is needed, others say compassion and understanding.
According to Greer Achenbach, Executive Director of Friends of C-Ville Downtown, the number of annual visitors to the Downtown Mall as gone from 3.5 million in 2017 to 2.5 million in 2023.
"If that trend continues," Achenbach told city councilors on Monday night," the mall will not survive."
Ironically, Michael Caplin, Co-Chair of the Friends of C-Ville Downtown, told councilors that, “everyone I talk to says they stopped coming downtown because it’s no longer fun.” He called it an “unregulated park where people are sleeping and sitting morning, noon, and night. He called on councilors to act so that “ the bricks do not become an unregulated pop-up campground.”
Long-time downtown business owner Joan Fenton said it’s “as bad as it’s ever been” in terms of the perception of the mall being unsafe, and fellow downtown business owner Blair Williamson called on the city to enforce its existing panhandling ordinance.
However, not all the downtown business owners invited by the Friends of C-Ville Downtown to speak took the same approach. Instead of enforcement and regulation, they were advocating for compassion and understanding.
Joan Kovatch, co-owner of The Beautiful Idea, told councilors they have a community-free fridge with food available and keep their restroom open to the public, both of which have been well-received and have caused no problems.
“It hurts my heart to see people be so cautious about accepting the simple generosity of some donated food,” said Kovatch, “especially when there is so much joy in the faces of people who donate.”
Kovatch’s business partner, Senlin Means, was more direct.
“I have never felt unsafe....and our customers never complain about feeling unsafe...and our business is doing great,” she said. “I do not think more police is an answer. In fact, I get really annoyed that we talk about it as if the unhoused folks were the problem....but they're not the problem...the problem is that they have nowhere to live.”