Slower pace OK with downtown

Business Report Correspondent

LOUISVILLE ? It’s still a place where you can get your hair cut and walk a block over to the bank, or pick up some ice cream, or perhaps, purchase a beer from your former state senator, who retired from politics well before the age of 40.

And the real charm of downtown Louisville is that it feels much the same as it did 25 years ago. People stop and chat on street corners and in neighborhood restaurants and pubs, much as they might have for the better part of a century.

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Cars are still allowed on Main Street, but you can always tell who the old-timers are because they stop to let you jaywalk. Downtown Louisville isn’t really any place for anyone in any particular hurry.

“I walk to work every day with my partner (in business and life),´ said Wildwood Guitars owner Steve Mesple, speaking of his wife, Marilynn. “It’s really one of the best parts of being in business here.”

Perhaps that was the point driven home in last November’s election to establish a taxing district for downtown administration. The Business Improvement District (BID), proposed by the Downtown Business Association, failed by a 31 to 31 vote.

“Frankly, I’m glad it failed by a tie, instead of winning by one vote,´ said Mesple, who voted for funding the district.

That opinion was echoed, although perhaps more politically, by Chuck Sisk, a Louisville city councilman whose vote is often important on downtown issues. “You would have had a high minority of people paying taxes over their objections,” Sisk noted. “Clearly, there were 31 voters who were not convinced and not persuaded.”

There’s still talk about possibly resurrecting the BID for another vote, but at this time, the business association has turned back to what it has best: lots of successful “ma and pa” operations. That, of course, is an old formula for success in downtown marketing. But here ? in stark contrast to the county’s largest downtown area, the Pearl Street Mall in Boulder ? it’s still modus operandi.

“The businesses here have always been small, family owned establishments,´ said Jo-an Barnett, the new executive director of the Downtown Business Association (DBA). “One of the first businesses in downtown was a women-run livery stable.”

A first priority for the DBA is to find a way to provide stable financing for an administrative staff. The funding for the staff in anticipation of the November funding ballot largely came from a $45,000 investment made by the Louisville city council.

An initial response was to focus on what downtown has in abundance ? local business owners. That is, the DBA’s first funding idea is to host a downtown session of courses tentatively called the Entrepreneurship School. “It’s sort of a school of hard knocks,” Barnett said. “So many of the businesses here have been home-grown. It seemed a natural.”

The idea came from former volunteer director Cheri Ruskis, owner of the Business Shop. Ruskis will run a series of business courses as part of the school.

Other fund-raising plans are also in the works. In preliminary stages are additional downtown festivities such as a Tomato Festival, celebrating the history of Italian Restaurants. The DBA is actively seeking more corporate membership from area companies such as Storage Technology Corp.

Prospects for downtown business on the whole are more than encouraging. Last year’s city sales taxes saw a double-digit increase from downtown, one of the highest growth areas in Louisville. The city has been on a sales-tax escalator for the last five years.

“I think it was in the area of 14 or 15 percent,” Sisk said. “At this point, (the DBA) hasn’t asked (the council) for more money, and we’ll continue to be a part of the Downtown Business Association.”

In the past, there have been numerous concerns from both the public and council members about the type of redevelopment that would be allowed. Although free parking is still readily available most of the time, it too was becoming an issue.

For now, those questions have been put aside with new building regulations and a $10,500 per-space fee for developers without the space to provide adequate parking. The city also has continued efforts to secure additional downtown properties for parking.

Plans are under way for a new 96th Street bypass, a direct pipeline from Storage Technology Corp. and U.S. Highway 36 that empties into downtown’s worst traffic locale, the intersection of Pine and Front streets. Planned renovation of the Highway 42 corridor also might lead to an expanded downtown commercial area east of the Burlington Northern train tracks and a new gateway into the downtown.

The tracks themselves are perhaps one of downtown Louisville’s most exciting attributes, as downtown could be a station on a Denver-Boulder heavy rail passenger service. Louisville Mayor Tom Davidson has been a driving force behind that proposal, which is under consideration as part of proposed U.S. 36 improvements.

“We’re really lucky in the sense that the environment right now in downtown Louisville is extremely healthy,´ said Barnett, who has 20 years of experience in downtown business associations. Most recently, Barnett was the executive director of the Colorado Community Revitalization Association, a 100-member organization supporting downtown areas throughout the state.

“The thing is, things always change,” Barnett said. “I’ve seen downtowns slip within a year. Things are good now, but there are now 36 food purveyors in FlatIron (Broomfield’s new mall), and we’ve got 14 restaurants right here in a four-block area.”

Still, nothing seems to shake the stability of one of Boulder County’s healthiest downtown areas. Sisk, who is a founding member of the Boulder law firm of Hurth, Yeager & Sisk, remembers much of his initial law business came from talking to folks on these laid-back streets.

“Louisville does have this great downtown image, and there’s many of us struggling mightily to keep it that way,” he said. “I think it’s the gem of Louisville, and we’ve just got to keep polishing it.”