Tax Proposal Divides Merchants in Ventura
There’s a battle brewing on Main Street in Ventura, a showdown that could shape the future of the bustling downtown business district.
On one side are merchants and property owners who support creation of an assessment district to pay for cleaner sidewalks, a marketing campaign and other services they say are needed to sustain the renaissance underway in the business core.
On the other side are fomenters of a tax revolt, a small but vocal band of business owners who say they already pay their fair share for services and fear that a new tax could swamp merchants struggling to stay afloat.
Some of them have put their displeasure on display, plastering store windows with handmade signs warning that they are being taxed out of town.
“This is double taxation in my opinion,” said longtime merchant Sheila Clancy, owner of Main Street Antiques, where the windows carry anti-tax slogans.
“I actually think the downtown is doing very well; for what’s going on with the country, we are all seeming to make it here,” Clancy added. “I don’t understand why we always have to [go for] more.”
Indeed, downtown Ventura has experienced an economic revival over the past decade. The city has poured millions into sprucing up streets with decorative sidewalks and palm trees, and has underwritten the cost of a four-story parking garage and a 10-screen movie theater.
The improvements have drawn a new breed of merchants, a mix of trendy boutiques and upscale eateries that have pumped life into the once-moribund Main Street.
Now a group of merchants, led by the Downtown Ventura Community Council, want to keep the momentum going by asking property owners to tax themselves to pay for enhanced services.
“We want to take the downtown renaissance to its next level,” said Doug Halter, a downtown business owner and member of the community council board. “It’s not just ‘another tax.’ It’s really business and property owners taking control of our destiny in downtown.”
The fight is not new to the downtown area.
More than a decade ago, downtown merchants were taxed under a controversial business improvement district administered by the city.
While that assessment district still technically exists, no one has paid into it for years and an effort is underway to dissolve it.
Under the current proposal, property owners -- not merchants who lease their space -- would be taxed, based on a formula still being developed by a consultant. Similar districts have helped sustain downtowns from Santa Monica to San Luis Obispo.
The Ventura district would be roughly bounded by Ash Street on the east, City Hall on the north, California 33 on the west and the beach on the south.
If approved, the district would exist for five years, and property owners would pay assessments based on the square footage of their lots and the square footage and linear street frontage of their buildings.
Supporters say the goal is to generate about $350,000 a year. The money would be used to enhance existing city services and to hire at least one full-time employee to do marketing, promotion and special-event planning.
“Ventura has a great downtown, but many people don’t know about it,” said Marco Li Mandri, the San Diego-based consultant developing the assessment formula. “I always say it’s like the difference between the U.S. mail and Federal Express: If you want something more in terms of delivery of service, you have to pay for it.”
The Downtown Ventura Community Council expects to get its first look at the assessment formula early next month and plans to share the information with property owners at a March 11 meeting.
A petition drive will then be launched seeking the support of at least half of the 300 to 400 property owners in the district.
If that happens, the Ventura City Council will be asked to put the issue on a June ballot that would only go to property owners in the proposed assessment district.
A simple majority is required for passage. If approved, the new assessment would appear on tax bills mailed out in August and payable in December.
“It’s an investment that will make businesses prosper,” said Loretta Merewether, a downtown business and property owner who co-founded the community council six years ago. “I think people are going to stand up and do the right thing.”
Downtown merchant Denise Sindelar isn’t sure a new tax is the right thing, especially in these uncertain times for the economy.
Co-owner of Natalie’s Fine Threads, Sindelar said many merchants are struggling just to keep pace with the rent increases that have washed over downtown in recent years. And while the new tax will affect property owners, there’s no question in her mind that the increases will trickle down to tenants such as herself who rent downtown space.
“I think there are a lot of businesses that are kind of hanging on,” Sindelar said. “We’re looking at an economic downturn, and I think an additional tax assessment is not necessarily the way to go at this time.”
Down the road at Main Street Antiques, Sheila Clancy worries something larger is at work.
While the push to spruce up the downtown has brought new blood -- a Subway sandwich shop opened recently and a Starbucks is due to open soon -- Clancy fears that older, established businesses like hers might be shoved aside.
And she said that would be a mistake, because it’s the antique stores and other niche shops that keep customers coming downtown.
“They are turning downtown into a strip mall, that’s my opinion,” Clancy said. “Right now it’s a good mix. I think they just need to leave us alone and let us conduct business.”
