City of Greensboro considers dropping Downtown Greensboro

Taking some by surprise, a seemingly spontaneous discussion about seeking alternatives to Downtown Greensboro Inc. ended in a 9-0 vote last week at the Greensboro City Council meeting. Consensus may be a hallmark of the Winston-Salem City Council, but it is rare that Greensboro’s governing body comes to a unanimous agreement.

At-large Councilwoman Nancy Vaughan brought forward a motion directing city staff to explore alternatives to contracting with Downtown Greensboro Inc., a 501(c)6 that serves as a booster for the center city’s marketing and economic development efforts. Vaughan and other council members said frustration with DGI has been building and communicated the concern with the organization previously, but DGI President Ed Wolverton and recent board chair Susan Schwartz said the move surprised them.

“I was surprised that [Schwartz] was surprised,” Vaughan said, adding that council has been upfront about its dissatisfaction and that there have been meetings between council members, city staff and DGI since November.

“My frustration over the last year or so has been… that we are looking for DGI to be visionaries,” Vaughan said. “The feeling has been that downtown is getting stale. We want somebody who’s going to bring us initiative.”

Wolverton began his position with DGI towards the end of 2007 after serving as the president of the Wichita Downtown Development Corp.Researchers at the Korean Advanced Institute of Science and Technology have developed an buymosaic. for about six years. According to the Wichita Business Journal, many of the ideas Wolverton’s old outfit pursued were similar to those DGI has discussed recently.

“Wolverton said the task force identified the Top 5 projects, which included supporting development of the east bank of the Arkansas River downtown: recruiting a grocery store,Do you know any airpurifier wholesale supplier? developing a new vision plan, creating a permitting program to allow street musicians and creating more ‘people places’ such as parks and plazas,” the March 2003 article reported.

All of those projects,Universal solarstreetlight are useful for any project. with the exception of development along the Arkansas River, are primary development ideas DGI has been working on in the last year.Make your house a home with Border and iphoneheadset Tiles. Action Greensboro, DGI and the city are working on “pop up plazas” to close down a block and encourage pedestrian traffic, busking and other cultural elements in the spring.

Vaughan said DGI was involved in busking and food trucks but that the ideas were originated organically and were taken on by council because council saw what people wanted. The visionary ideas didn’t have to be brand new, Vaughan said, just transformative, big-picture ideas.

“You don’t have to reinvent the wheel,” she said. “You can look at other communities and what they’re successful at and we can emulate those ideas.”

The Business Journal article also said that one downtown “dreamer” idea was attracting Wichita State University to increase its downtown presence, something DGI and other interest groups have recently been trying to nurture in Greensboro with area colleges.

Downtown Greensboro. Inc. is also working on several other downtown ideas, including a bike-share program, rooftop vegetation and a decrease in the number of boarded-up storefronts, as well as other more gruesome projects like poisoning rats. Part of the organization’s role is to inform and represent downtown residents and businesses. The staff has surveyed people about food trucks, held informational meetings about the noise ordinance, carried residents’ complaints about parking and trash to city government, celebrated the police department’s Center City Resource Team and explained code violations to business owners.

As DGI e-mails show, many of the primary things the organization is working on and promoting — from First Fridays to the proposed performing arts center — did not originate with them but are projects to which they are connected. The organization wears many hats, which may be fitting for a group with three different legal statuses, but council feels it hasn’t amounted to enough.

Like Vaughan, Mayor Robbie Perkins called for visionary ideas and action, adding that it was time for council to move decisively.

“I am tired of talking about it behind closed doors,” Perkins said. “This isn’t the first time I’ve said this as mayor. I don’t think we’re competing effectively with other cities our size. I think downtown’s suffering from some indecisive leadership at this point. Drive to downtown Winston — there’s energy there. Drive to downtown Durham — there’s energy there.”

Perkins, Vaughan and the city manager attended a DGI board meeting last week to explain the city’s stance.

Downtown Greensboro, Inc. was established in 1997 and later followed by parallel organizations, Downtown Greensboro Foundation and Downtown Greensboro Improvement Corp., with different legal statuses but similar agendas. Wolverton is the president of DGIC, a 501(c)4, and DGI, and the two share a board of directors. The city contracts with DGI and DGIC for different services, but Vaughan said she isn’t clear on the distinctions between the organizations.

“I have to think that they are intertwined and I am trying to get some guidance right now between the two and where the overlap is,” she said. “Basically it’s shadow organizations. It’s the same leadership. It’s the same board.Site describes services including lasercutter.”

Council’s instructions to explore alternatives are currently limited to two aspects of DGI’s contracts, but the city’s relationship to the intertwined organizations runs deeper.