file photo by ArtChick
No doubt online shopping has had a huge negative effect on retailers and the problem is not going away any time soon. The question for towns like Ridgewood is what to do with downtowns that were conceived and build decades ago and are now becoming functionally irrelevant. We certainly do not want or need more restaurants, nail salons or banks. So should we simply turn our backs and let the CBD continue to spiral downward ? Many residents do not seem to care one way or the other. Of course, these same folks will be the first to squeal when their RE taxes start to rise dramatically to offset the revenue decline stemming from rapidly declining commercial property values. If you think for a moment the VOR will trim it’s budget to offset declining tax revenue you are either dreaming or smoking something illegal. The question then becomes what to do to help insure the continuance of a healthy revenue stream from the commercial sector. The proposed luxury apartments will certainly help stabilize Village coffers but many residents strongly object to such development. The purpose of this post is to create an open forum on what can or should the Village do to insure the continuance of a sufficient long term revenue stream so that taxes paid by residents does not spiral out of control. Suggestions and comments please..
What exactly is the amount of taxes contributed by the CBD. I have heard various rumors starting from very little to a lot. What are the facts.
Look , if restaurants bring in the dough , and clothes and hardware don’t, why fight what is working. There are, what, about 50 or so eating venues, so the CBD already is full of restaurants, and no one has died from that disease. Ditto for hair salons, the wave of the future.
Multi family housing is approved , what, two complexes, maybe more. So that will pay taxes too.
If a few novelty shops go out of business for more pizza and nails, so what. I guess restaurants and hair and nails fall under service industries. If that’s popular , why fight it; things change as you guys are always saying, so be with the times. People are not going to stop shopping online. We have restaurant row now.
First has to be the school budget. We are spending millions to make sure that the first grader in Hawes studies the same thing as the first grader at Ridge. This is a huge waste of money. Let the schools run themselves with minimal oversight from BOE. By Jr. High they will have learned enough of the same things. BOE also drives lots of absences by teachers for development days and assessment of students. Cut it. Stop paying subs for those days and let the teachers teach. We also may need to look long and hard at what we are paying in insurance and coaches for certain expensive sports like football and swimming. We may not be able to offer the same sports and clubs we once did.
Second, we have way too much empty commercial space. Currently landlords are happy to leave the buildings empty and collect the rent from the failed business while paying lower taxes on the lower valued building. That has to change. We need to find ways to create incentives to encourage landlord to take new tenants. With more and more people working remotely, it would seem like some office space in town might help. (Im not sure how the shared office place is doing??) A program to reinvigorate the office space that exists above retail in town might help. At minimum, reduced construction permits and fast tracked inspections and approvals would help. Same for the empty space on Dayton. If those spaces are filled, the assessments rise and we would collect more in RE taxes.
Finally, there is the huge nut of police and fire budget. These should be shared services. We do not need 35 cops in town plus parking enforcement. Fire Department is great but when you factor in equipment, insurance and pensions its really expensive. Something’s got to give. There has been talk of including pension obligations when we talk about salaries but that has not happened. It has to. Each cop costs us millions in total obligations.
You ensure the healthy continuance by giving patrons a place to park then businesses will not be so reluctant to move into Ridgewood.
There is plenty of parking except on weekend nights, and that goes for all of Bergen County areas with restaurants and entertainment open on weekend nights. You build a parking garage and it will never pay for itself and taxes will go way up for residents.
continued: why should residents support businesses with a parking garage. Taxes will go up and people will still not patronize the businesses.
There is enough parking for Mango Jam right now. You can leave the area empty and still not enough people will buy there, because nick knacks, paddy wack , give a dog a bone, people are just not interested in knick knacks. That goes for all retail in town. Maybe paint stores will stay. People don’t buy paint online, do they. I don’t. And people don’t like to clutter up there rooms with knick knacks paddy wacks give a dog a bone. The bare minimalist look is in.
There is plenty of space downtown in areas that are not towards the Broad Street end of the Village. And there is plenty of vacant space marked for “permit holders”–look on the far side of Mt Carmel. Just the number of employees in the area closer to Broad St. almost equals the total number of spaces in the area. Some success was had several years ago by marking the tires and checking. The solution found by the employees was to either erase the mark or trade spots with another employee car. Surely one of our Villagers can come up with a solution to free spaces for shoppers.
the roads are dirty. why . don’t we have sweepers any more. the roads are loaded up by my house on hillcrest,rd