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HomeMy WebLinkAboutDowntown Advisory - 1999-03-11DAC\1999-03-11 KITCHENER DOWNTOWN ADVISORY COMMITTEE MINUTES MARCH 11, 1999 The Kitchener Downtown Advisory Committee met this date under the Chairmanship of Councillor Mark Yantzi with the following members present: Howard Marr, Nancy Brawley, Denise Strong, Anita Petsche Good, Tom Brennand, Denise Shelbourne, David Gowland, Ruth Tomlinson, Regis Coladipietro, Greg Kett, Trudy Beaulne and Arli Klassen. Others Present: Tim McCabe, Brock Stanley, Tim Fox, Randy Mattice, David Corks, Peter Walberg, Grant Nixon, and Lori Morrison from The Walter Fedy Partnership. Regrets: Mayor Carl Zehr, Councillor Berry Vrbanovic, Councillor Karen Taylor- Harrison, Peggy Walshe, Mary Drandzyk, Mary Elizabeth Coleman, Brian Scott, and Staff Sgt. Gary Askin. APPROVAL OF AGENDA- MARCH 11, 1999 The Agenda for the March 11th meeting was approved with the following addition: Discussion on Mutual Parking Lot. Moved by: David Gowland Seconded by: Tom Brennand CARRIED APPROVAL OF MINUTES- FEBRUARY 11, 1999 It was moved that the minutes of the February 11, 1999 meeting be approved. Moved by: Anita Petsche Good Seconded by: Ruth Tomlinson CARRIED It was moved that the minutes of the December 10, 1998, and January 14, 1999 meetings also be approved. Moved by: Trudy Beaulne Seconded by: Nancy Brawley CARRIED It was brought to the attention of the Chair by Trudy Beaulne that two motions were put on the floor at the January 14, 1999 meeting that needed to be approved as quorum was not met at that meeting. The following two motions were read to the Committee: That the City undertake a study on the parking situation between Victoria & Union (K-W Hospital) area. Moved by: Trudy Beaulne Seconded by: Tom Brennand CARRIED That the City undertake a study on the impact of traffic downtown on the surrounding residential neighbourhoods. Consider the liveability assessment, to look at pedestrians and residents, quality of life. Moved by: Trudy Beaulne Seconded by: Tom Brennand CARRIED Mark Yantzi informed the Committee that the 4 Committee Members at large will be considered by PED Committee on March 22® with a recommendation to Council for approval on March 29th. DOWNTOWN CHURCH TOURS Tim Fox advised the committee that the downtown church tours are scheduled for May 30, 1999. They are looking for volunteers to conduct tours, hand out flyers, and provide advertising through newsletters. At the last meeting this committee had inquired as to how they could get involved. Mark felt that we would need to organize a smaller sub-group rather than involve the whole Committee. Trudy felt that the role of this Committee would have to be a "manageable" role, perhaps a kick-off. Mark asked for volunteers.No commitment was made and therefore, no further action will be taken by the committee. APPROACH TO PROGRESS UPDATES OF DOWNTOWN STRATEGIC PLAN Tim McCabe suggested that the Committee agenda be approached in a different way using the recently approved Downtown Strategic Plan. We need to structure the agenda more to co-ordinate with the activities areas set out in the plan and stay on track with our mandate. The plan wasn't developed to sit on a shelf, rather as a work plan. Nancy Brawley suggested that we set out timelines and report on what progress has been made with all objectives. David Gowland asked how items are placed on the agenda. Tim explained that items are added to Future A,qenda Items as requested and are then moved forward when applicable. STATUS OF COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT PLAN/HEALTHY COMMUNITIES Brock Stanley brought the committee up to date on the status of the plan. This goes back to October 1997 when it was questioned whether we should have a Community Development/Strategic Plan. A presentation was made to this Committee in December 1997 by D'Arcy Farlow on Healthy Communities. A three year 1998-2000 Corporate Strategic Plan was approved through Council. The Committee pulled together to look at a Community Development Strategic Plan with a healthy community attachment. Management, Community Services Committee and Council have all adopted the Healthy Communities concept. The City will be registered as a Healthy Community. The City already has a good foundation of community groups for support. UPDATE BY DOWNTOWN DEVELOPMENT TEAM David advised the committee that Manulife held their Open House on Wednesday, March 10th. Their employees appear very happy with 100% positive comments received. U.S. studies have shown that workers spend approximately $10 a day while at work. This translates into over $1,000,000 a year being contributed to the downtown by the Manulife employees. The new Whitney Industry Report has been publicly released. It shows a vacancy rate in Kitchener Downtown of only 17.5%. This is good news for us. The April issue of "Chatelaine" included an article entitled "How Safe Is Your City"? Kitchener was ranked the 3rd safest city in Canada. This is a national magazine. The ranking will be useful to use in our promotional material. There has been an increase in posters being displayed on poles in the downtown. Pat Tvrdon, Enforcement Officer, will be walking the downtown to tag the posters. A picture of the poster will be taken and Public Works will remove them. The owner of the poster will be charged $60 per poster for removal. Two big events are scheduled for the spring. The Open Ears Festival will be held on May 19-24. A three-on-three streetball (basketball) tournament is being considered to be held on Duke Street June 11-13. There has been several enquiries regarding residential property in the downtown. One group is actively looking at the Forsythe building. There is also potentially 3 or 4 major office space users that the DDT is dealing with. There has been much publicity regarding the Council resolution on liquor licences for new bars and nightclubs. A set of criteria must now be developed. The criteria will help determine who the City supports in having their liquor licence approved and which should be refused. The control of who obtains their licence is at the Provincial level. The Mayor will be holding an information session on March 29th for current licence holders to discuss current issues. Speakers will include representatives from the Alcohol & Gaming Commission, the Waterloo Regional Police, the KDBA, and the City of Kitchener. If the owners do not attend the meeting, avoiding the situation will not be accepted as an excuse. Tim McCabe informed the Committee of the opening of the Business Enterprise Centre. This is a non-profit centre with both public and private sponsorship. The centre is an out growth of the old Self-Help Centre. Anyone starting a new business can use the centre for consulting, reference material, internet access, help in writing a business plan or marketing plan, registering their business, etc. The centre will monitor all new businesses for a 5 year period. Kathi Smith is the Manager of the centre. As part of the Business Enterprise Centre, final negotiations are underway for a Provincial "common counter" service that will see the hiring of 3 provincial employees. Forms and information from 15 different ministries will be available. They will also provide service within City Hall through directions, selling of publications, tourism information. Arlie Klassen advised that the Community Information Centre have also been in touch with the common counter people. They are unable to partner with them as they are a non- government agency, but they will have access to each others information. Part of the Enterprise Centre includes a partnership with the School Board. They offer a 32 week training program to young entrepreneurs on how to start their business, how to write a business plan, how to prepare a marketing plan and where funding is available. David Gowland inquired about the status of the proposed "peep show". The affidavit for court has been submitted, but there is no further information to date. David Gowland also inquired about the OASIS donut shop. David Corks, along with Councillor Karen Taylor-Harrison and Tim Fox, will be meeting with OASIS representatives to find out what their plan is. They have been unclear as to whether it is going to be a group home or a drop-in centre. David will report back to the Committee at the next meeting. Tom Brennand had someone knock on his door asking for donations for the OASIS 24-hour drop-in centre. David will check to see if this is legitimate. KDBA REPORT Nancy has had some interesting conversations with a few new businesses downtown informing her that working with the City of Kitchener was a "pleasurable experience". The City of Kitchener has contributed seed money to the Poseidon Project. They are in the process of selecting consultants to conduct studies on fundraising, preliminary architectural design, and to develop an initial marketing package. We should know in 3-4 months if the project will move forward. The KDBA have finalized their budget for 1999. They will be focusing on support of events, shop downtown campaign, marketing strategy targeted at their membership, development of image advertising, and implementation of more research from a marketing and a business development perspective. The rejuvenation of Market Village is well underway. Three leases have been signed and new businesses hope to open within 2 months. Students from the Landscape Architecture school in Guelph are working on a plan for the entire block with staff and abutting owners. .... th · They will be finished by April 6 and hope to have a display in the rotunda. Christkindl Market won a Festivals Ontario Award. This is quite an accomplishment for a second year event. Another Taste of Downtown was held for employees of Pricewaterhouse Coopers. A fantastic job was done by the downtown restaurants. Nancy informed the Committee of the Annual General Meeting of the KDBA to be held at the Four Points Hotel on Tuesday, March 30, 1999 @ 7:30 am. (Nancy's notes are attached for more detailed information on all of the above.) NEIGHBOURHOOD ASSOCIATION UPDATES David Gowland inquired as to who the current contact was at the City regarding property standards. Every time he calls the City with a concern he is put in touch with a different person. It is very hard to start over every time. David circulated pictures of a property at 652 King St. East that is in disrepair. All four people he has dealt with at the City have agreed that something should be done, but nothing has happened. He has been trying for four years to get some action on the property. Tim advised him that the enforcement co- ordinator has not been replaced yet, but Jim Witmer is in charge at the present time and should be contacted directly. Tim will try to push things along. Tom Brennand advised that he has had several positive comments on the new light at Krug and River Road. Everyone seems to like it. Trudy advised that the Women's Career Planning workshop is well underway. They are offering one day session and one evening session. The title of the workshop is "1 could do anything if I only knew what it was". They had 44 attendees 2 years ago, and hope to be as successful this time. Their neighbourhood babysitter club is working well and their movie night continues to be a great success. They have gained access to Sacred Heart school gym for day use. They will be using it as a drop-in centre for kids. Their neighbourhood association is still very concerned about the Mutual Parking lot and the proposed Highway 7 project. Peter Walberg informed the Committee that he is wearing 2 hats, one with the KDBA and the other representing the Central Frederick N.A. He asked if there were any objections, none given. Ruth Tomlinson informed the Committee that the home invasion earlier in the week took place in her neighbourhood. They are doing as much as they can for youth in their area, offering a drop in centre that is open until 10:00. Their neighbourhood has always been very safe in the past. Denise advised the Committee that the Cedar Hill coffee house was a success. The money they raised will be used for the folk festival this summer. David Gowland inquired as to who sets the agenda for the Committee and if there were any neighbourhood reps present at the meetings. Tim advised him that Mark, Carol and himself set the agenda from the list of future agenda items. If the neighbourhood associations have any items they would like discussed, they should advise Mark or Carol 2 weeks prior to the meeting. Regis handed out sponsorship forms and nominations forms for "The 1st Annual Independent Living Awards". Over the last 4-5 years there has been an outstanding improvement in accessibility in Kitchener. These new awards will be launched May 19th at the Country Hills Community Centre. Nominations can include individuals, companies, non-profit organizations. There will be 6 awards, and they hope to have sponsorship for them. Sponsorship for the event is $2,000, for an award it's $500. MUTUAL PARKING LOT Due to some confusion with the time of the meeting, Susan Wismer was not in attendance. The Committee was supplied with a Staff Report that will be discussed at Council on March 22®. Anyone can attend the meeting and make comments before Council. The original application made by Mutual was to demolish all houses within the block. That has been reduced to 17 houses within the block bounded by King St., Union Blvd., Park St., and Mt. Hope St. Eight houses on Park St. will be retained and converted for use by non- profit groups for a minimum of 3 years. When Mutual lost the 350 parking spaces at the Labatt site, they were in desperate need of finding more spaces. This demolition will provide 272 spaces. This doesn't solve all their parking problems, and they will be promoting transit and car pooling. It was suggested that they raise their current parking structure, but the design can't support it. This new parking lot is only an interim use. It could be developed at some time for office use, but they cannot provide any time lines. Trudy expressed her concern that this represents one half of the houses in that area. The secondary plan intended that block would be redeveloped at some time, but not for a parking lot. This is a serious problem - there is no development plan, we don't know when it will be redeveloped, or what it will be. Nancy questioned why the remaining houses were being leased to non-profit groups and not remaining residential. Mark informed her that it was a compromise. Insurance companies are very sensitive to criticism and they didn't want to have to evict residents again. Howard Marr mentioned that the Mutual Group is a huge organization. They can't tell us how fast the company will grow. Future development of the area could be great, let's hope it can happen ASAP. The meeting adjourned at 10:30 am Carol Robinson, Committee Secretary LIST OF ATTACHMENTS KDBA Report