Proposed downtown business improvement district

If you build it, will they come?

Downtown Honolulu, once full of office workers frequenting restaurants at lunch, has seen a decline in office occupancy since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic and is in need of revitalization, businesses and developers say.

But even if they build change, they’re afraid people won’t come, so they’d like to create a business improvement district to help eliminate crime, pollution and homelessness first.

It is the first objective: “Clean and safe”.

“It’s great to have festivals and events, but they cost money,” said Avalon Group CEO Christine Camp. “We need to focus on cleanliness and safety. That’s what we have to start with.”

Two hundred stakeholders — residents, business and property owners, developers, government officials — packed the Laniakea YWCA auditorium last week to hear panelists tout the plan, with many opinions.

Colbert Matsumoto, head of Tradewind Group, brought a group of 40 businesses to the table and they have come up with a plan to form a BID from Nuuanu Avenue to Richards Street (Ewa in Diamond Head) and South Beretania Street in Ala Moana. Boulevard (mauka te makai).

Hawaii Pacific University Chief of Security Chris Martin said at Wednesday’s event, “We struggle with the downtown environment, the homeless downtown.”

Although crime is down, the real problem is the insecurity of walking downtown after 6 p.m. otherwise, Martin said. HPU has downsized its Fort Street Mall campus but still remains there.

The BID would initially focus on keeping public spaces clean and safe, and require property owners to pay a fee, which could be passed on to tenants.

A draft budget proposes charging 1 to 3 cents per square foot, which would work out to about $30 a month for a 1,000-square-foot space, Camp said.

The initial plan would be for five years, calling for the creation of a non-profit organization governed by a board or committee of business owners, landowners and government representatives.

It would be funded by assessments on property owners, which would be collected by the city.

May provide services such as security, maintenance and advocacy; implement branding and marketing campaigns; produce public events such as street events; and make capital improvements.

That would require an ordinance supported by the City Council.

The initial step would be a petition signed by landowners who own land within the proposed district that has an assessed real property tax value of at least 25% of the total assessed real property tax value of their all land in the proposed district.

If 51% of owners object, the process is stopped.

“If it fails, it doesn’t get renewed,” Camp said. She said her company has already made a significant bet in downtown Honolulu by making several big purchases there in recent years with the goal of changing the look of the district.

“The stars are aligned — not just us, but other investors are actively involved,” she said.

Reyn Tanaka, vice president and asset manager of WKF Inc., says he has been involved with the Fort Street Mall BID for nine years.

The BID has helped communicate with other property owners to reimagine the downtown, to drive pedestrian traffic rather than the “traditional lunch rush and rush, then nothing.”

It has opened an adult nursery and the first Hawaii Paris Baguette, a South Korea-based bakery chain, to send a message that it supports downtown revitalization.

Waikiki BID Association President and CEO Trevor Abarzua said the Waikiki BID spends 70% of its budget to keep it clean and safe with 60 Aloha Ambassadors, some focused on safety and others on hospitality.

He is proud of the BID’s success in reducing Waikiki crime from its first year to its second year (starting in September 2021), citing a 67% reduction in drug and alcohol crimes, 35% in robberies, 32 % reduction in thefts and 27% reduction in criminal property damage.

Its success is due to partnerships with police, prosecutors, homeless workers and its Safe & Sound initiative funded by grants from the Kosasa Foundation and the city.

Waikiki has seen a 27% reduction in homelessness, Abarzua says, and the initiative “isn’t just to get them out; it’s to house them, get them medication or send them back to the mainland if they’re where they’re from.”

Since there aren’t enough police to patrol the closed parks at night, the city helped provide grounds workers to help clean up the beaches and those sleeping near storefronts.

“If (they) don’t want to keep hitting and hitting,” they leave; otherwise, workers warn they will call the police and “they get up and move,” he said.

Moderator Chris Fong asked: “Where do they go after they get hit and pushed? In the city center?”

This drew a big laugh from the audience.

Honolulu District Attorney Steve Alm said police arrested 200 in Chinatown.

“We’re evaluating them and addressing their behavioral health,” he said. “We can try to get them into treatment and get them out of there. Arrest may be a real answer to all of this.”

The homeless sheltering downtown is part of what some say is keeping future residents from wanting to live there.