IF Downtown Development Corporation (IFDDC)

Idaho Falls Downtown Development Corp. board meeting was held in the Syringa Networks Board Room (460 Park Ave) at 8:30am August 6, 2019 Attendance: Antonio Meza, Kevin Cutler, Greg Crockett, Jake Durtschi, Shanon Taylor, Jill Hansen, Kevin Josephson, Derek Christiansen, Cindy Napier, Tasha Taylor, Brandi Newton, Dana Briggs, Jim Francis - Staff: Catherine Smith, Mala Lyon, Whitney Johnson; visitors: Jim Pletcher, Richard Napier Minutes for July 2, 2019 were reviewed – Jake motioned they be approved; Greg seconded, and board approved Shanon – financial report: Changes for the June financial report were made to show the ‘work in progress’ category that shows invoice and payment and doesn’t go against the profit and loss. The June financial report of June 2019 motion was made by Brandi to approve; Jake seconded board approved. July financial report – pre-pad parking permits is income we don’t own and we would have to give it back if canceled. It was set up as statement charges rather than invoices in QuickBooks by JF Bell Accounting. The new parking software will fix that issue. We used $20,000 of the line of credit which has been paid back and we are functioning on or own money again. Taste of Downtown was a successful event. Parking income is up. Two of the three murals are paid for. Final balance of $17,800. If we end the fiscal year with a profit from the events Catherine would like to roll that money over into the Foundation to help with grant matches. Greg said that all event money used to go into the Foundation and asked what is the criteria to move the money? Catherine explained that it is at the discretion of the board. The is no policy in place and Brandi pointed out that it is not good to have a required percentage that must be moved every year in the case of a lean year. This fits our mission, we have events to make money to make improvements to downtown. Shanon proposed that the July 2019 financial report be approved; Cindy seconded and board approved. Catherine – We have been working with Capital City and Boise to better understand how to make our downtown parking work the best that it can. Our parking lots are pay to park 24/7 with free parking with validation. Ed has been able to be in the lots in the evenings and weekends and we have seen a substantial increase in income from the evening and weekend parking. Ed has worked very hard to help people understand the process of picking up a ticket, displaying the envelope and getting validation or paying $1 per hour or $5 per day. If they do not follow the rules they are tagged with a ticket and envelope on their vehicle. We were told to look at our parking in zones with on-street being the most valuable and charge the most to park there, but free after 6:00pm (zone A), pay to park lots, which are pay/validate 24/7 (zone B) and then the free all day lots are zone C. Since we charge for parking in the lots in the evening this switches the value of zone A & B. The validation is $100 per year unlimited. Jake said we need to think of whether we are in it for the revenue or public service? People are not happy when they come downtown for Alive After 5 and then go back to their car and find a ticket. Richard said the Yellowstone/A Street lot is empty after 5:00pm giving the impression that there is nothing downtown. He used to ask his employees to park in the lot on Saturdays to give the impression of people downtown. Kevin J. – it’s a multifaced problem with on-street usually not being able to park right in front of where you want to go and perception that since you can’t park there, there is no parking downtown available. Brandi the motivation switches in the evenings to people that are coming to go to dinner and events rather than employees parking. We pay to have parking permits for our employees, but it needs to be easy to be downtown in the evenings. Greg agreed we are not in the business to make lots of money and ticketing people is making people mad. We took over the parking lots years ago to make parking downtown better. Mala explained that the Yellowstone/A Street lot is easy to manage, but the B Street lots are very difficult with the evening and overnight parking. We have the Nelson Apartment there and they parked overnight all the time prior to Ed patrolling the lots in the evenings and giving out tickets. We have gotten complaints too, but the majority are ok with paying to park or getting validations. Ed has worked very hard to educate people on how the lots work. Tasha asked if the two parking lots could be treated as two different zones? Richard said they should all be the same. Greg made a motion that the lots be free parking evenings after 6:00pm and free on weekends with no overnight parking allowed from 2:00am to 6:00pm. Antonio seconded it and board approved. Validation with the new meters will be accessed thru an app or online. The merchant will put their license plate # in the program and there will be no charge. People will pull in, put their license plate # in and pay for the amount of time they think they will use. Then if they are there longer they can add more time thru the app or when they get validation there is no charge. Kevin J suggested that we give every merchant 25 free validations so that all of downtown validates and that will show the merchants how it works. Validation charges to merchants will be on per use basis with the meters rather than an unlimited use. Budget - We are estimating our expenses to be high and revenue to be low for this next year until we see how it is going to be with the on-street parking. We have requested $50,000 operating costs from the city. There will be a .07 charge per transaction in the meters. Jake made the motion to approve the 2019-20 budget; Brandi seconded it and board approved. Broadway project is complete. Corner project is very close. The Celt has purchased the Park Avenue Mercantile building and want to expand the sidewalk and pavers to the north. This fits in the Downtown Master Plan. Working with the city to make this happen. Parking meters should be here by the end of the month. 2 in the Yellowstone/A Street lot, 1 in the lot behind Smokin’ Fins and 2 in the B Street lots. It will be a learning curve for people to figure out this new system and pay with credit or debit cards. We plan to have tutorials and information and training to the merchants and customers on how it works and how to use it. Brandi said it will be very important to make sure staff knows how it works. Public art – looking at more projects and will be having a art committee meeting in the fall. Great Harvest would like to have a mural north of their sign. Meeting was adjourned at 9:37am. Our next board meeting will be held September 10, 2019. Respectfully submitted by Kevin Josephson, IFDDC secretary and Mala Lyon