There is a long list of agencies – both public and private – with collective multi-million dollar reserves, 6-figure executives and shared missions of economic development in Greater Springfield.
SPRINGFIELD — From his perch in a second-story law office in a converted Victorian home on Chestnut Street, attorney Thomas Rooke in the early morning hours watches a truckload of five men water a colorful hanging planter full of pansies outside his office, five days per week, three warm months out of the year.
For this, he pays $1,600.
Rooke, one of more than 150 downtown commercial property owners, is among a few vocally resistant members of the Springfield Business Improvement District, an agency with a complex background and apparently an unclear future.
Business Improvement Districts (BIDs) were established through statewide legislation in the late 1990s to supplement municipal services and focus on the beautification of urban downtowns.
Locally they were established in this city, Westfield, Northampton and, most recently, Amherst, all with varying degrees of success.
In Northampton, a group of members filed a federal lawsuit against the state, contending the mandatory BID fees are unconstitutional and an illegal tax. In Westfield, a group of business owners is circulating a petition to dissolve the BID there, arguing the spirit of the original legislation intended membership to be voluntary.
Fees in Springfield range from more than $30,000 annually for a group of buildings at 11-13 Hampden St. that also borders Main and Gridiron streets (the New England Farm Workers Council) to more than $18,000 for downtown property owner James Santaniello for several properties (including the building which houses the Mardi Gras strip club and two others) to Tower Square, which is assessed at $164,000, according to city records.
The geographic area the BID spans from the heart of downtown at Main and Worthington streets, up to Chestnut Street and over to a portion of the Riverfront which includes the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. Springfield Riverfront Development Corp. pays just under $20,000 in fees to the BID. However the museum space is exempted from the formula, so the fees apply to the tenants of the hall-of-fame building.
The Springfield downtown’s heyday is far in the rear view mirror any way you slice it: Whether it was the peak with two major department stores, Steiger’s and Forbes & Wallace, in the 1960s and 1970s, or the brief renaissance of the entertainment district in the 1990s, the general consensus is currently fending off defeat while many are salivating over the proposed $800 million MGM Resorts International casino project for the South End.
This artist's rendering of the MGM Springfield casino project shows the view from Union Street looking at the pedestrian walkway leading to the entertainment plaza, anchored by an Apple merchandise store, movie theater, bowling alley, and a wide array of retail, restaurants and entertainment. Commercial properties are worryingly empty; bars and restaurants generally come and go; there are few retail anchors or bright spots.
Ward 6 City Councilor Kenneth Shea, the new chairman of the council’s Economic Development Subcommittee, characterizes the city’s downtown as “dismal.”
“Everyone puts out there that this casino is going to be the savior and solve all of our problems,” Shea said. “My thing that I have worked on quietly is trying to get improved rail service between Springfield and Boston. I think it’s more important for people being able to get jobs out of this area but stay in affordable housing.”
The long-defunct Union Station in the city’s North End neighborhood has drawn millions in federal dollars for rehabilitation and also is slated to improve the complexion of downtown but has yet to materialize.
There is a long list of agencies – both public and private – with collective multimillion-dollar reserves, six-figure executives and shared missions of economic development in Greater Springfield. The BID is a small fish in that pond, but illustrative of the evident overlap of services and an apparent lack of cohesion and optimal results, despite millions in private and public dollars.
Rooke’s perspective provides a barometer of some members’ opinions of the value of the BID, but not one without history. He has tangled with mayors, sued the city on behalf of bar-owner clients and resisted the BID fees for a decade. He previously opted out of the fees, which are based on square footage, in the late 1990s, but was essentially strong-armed legislatively into paying them when they became mandatory through a change in state law in 2012.
Springfield attorney Thomas Rooke owns a commercial property downtown and is a dissatisfied member of the Springfield Business Improvement District (BID). “For $1,600, I passed the cost along to my partners and tenants. I decided it wasn’t worth the fight,” Rooke said. “But, I watch what they do for the fees. It’s like the old joke: how many guys does it take to water a plant?”
Rooke said he’s had many clients who owned downtown bars and restaurants and were displeased with BID services.
They are all out of business, he added.
He was among some 50-plus downtown property owners who two years ago were forced into paying the fees. Many BID detractors prefer to call the fees a tax since they are obligatory.
In addition to property taxes, which cover municipal services, property owners who fall within the BID are mandated to pay the additional fees or face having liquor licenses revoked or liens placed on properties. New legislation passed in 2012 took away property owners’ power to opt out of the BID and made membership mandatory for five years. It was put to a vote among members in Springfield last year; however, members who had opted out or those who were not current on their fees were excluded from the vote, according to participants.
The fees cover the costs of occasional litter pick-up, maintenance of flower planters and weekly downtown concerts that attract a tide of bikers, according to the members.
Certain business owners, like Tim Andrew, owner of Tyre Trak at the corners of Worthington and Chestnut streets, do not own their properties and are able to pass along BID fees to their landlords.
“Mine pays $1,500 a year. He tried to insist that I pay it, but I said no. I pay $10,000 in taxes each year, I don’t pay fees,” Andrew said, adding that he occasionally sees BID workers sweeping up his parking lot and watering plants around the building. “If I had to pay the fees, I might resent it. I’d just as soon sweep my own parking lot.”
Aside from the statewide controversy over the change in the BID law, Springfield BID director Don Courtemanche abruptly resigned recently. He was immediately replaced by Christopher Russell, of Wilbraham, as interim director. Russell in 2000 launched a landscaping company with zero clients out of his garage, and grew his customer base to 3,000, including commercial clients from Boston to New Jersey.
Russell said he sold his business, Prospect Landscaping, in 2010 for an undisclosed amount of money to a national company and moved his family to Vermont for three years.
He returned to the area in the fall and contacted Paul Picknelly, a BID board member, downtown real estate mogul and hotel owner with a financial interest in the MGM casino. They had met when Russell managed Market Square on Main Street, Russell said.
Paul Picknelly, a downtown real estate owner with a financial interest in the prospective $800 million casino planned for the city's South End, is shown here at a 2013 victory rally for MGM International following a successful referendum among the city's voters. Picknelly began making introductions on his behalf late last year. Russell, a father of two, said his discussions with a subcommittee of BID board members began in the late fall.
Picknelly did not respond to a call for comment.
It is not the first time a Springfield BID director suddenly resigned. Jeffrey Keck resigned in 2009 with little fanfare, with the explanation that he was a “California guy” who wanted to return to the West Coast. Keck succeeded Robert Turin, who retired after seven years with the BID in 2006. The Springfield BID was created in 1998.
Keck never responded for comment about why he left at the time, and Courtemanche said he was “contractually obligated” not to talk about his departure.
BID board member Evan Plotkin, a major commercial property owner in the downtown, said he was not included in the hiring of Russell. That search was conducted by a subcommittee of members including MassMutual executive Nicholas Fyntrilakis, Picknelly, property owner Francis Cataldo and BID chairman Frank Crinella, an executive with TD Bank.
“I think Don was an outstanding steward for the downtown; I wish he was still here. That’s not to take anything away from Mr. Russell,” Plotkin said.
Fyntrilakis said Courtemanche’s resignation did not go to a vote of the board members and the decision to choose Russell was tasked to the subcommittee. All personnel discussions occur in executive session, therefore meeting minutes are not publicly available, he said.
For Russell’s part, he is enthusiastic, personable and apparently capable of growing a business from zero to 60 in short order. During a recent interview, he made no bones about what he does and does not know about the downtown but is keen to learn.
He told a reporter he had a vision of a downtown teeming with young people and more market rate housing but no specific plan how to get there. He said he plans to quickly plot one, however.
Russell says he developed an expertise in self-marketing, budget management, customer service and vendor supervision while growing his company. He had a vague awareness of a certain number of disgruntled members and a slightly fractured board but felt confident he can win them over.
“The board will judge whether I’m performing or not, and, if I’m not they’ll replace me. But I will give 110 percent,” Russell said. “I have to perform. That’s life. But I’m used to wearing a lot of different hats.”
Russell in 2011 moved to Wilmington, Vt., where Tropical Storm Irene leveled or displaced some of its cultural icons, including Dot’s Diner, which Russell worked to rebuild. He and his family decided to move back to Western Massachusetts last year. Russell said he began to put feelers out late in 2013 to explore job opportunities.
During an interview on the third day in his new post, Russell said he is a “people person” and intends to begin knocking on doors to take the temperature of BID members.
“I’ll find out what they like and what they don’t like. if I can’t provide the services they’re looking for, I’ll tell them why,” Russell said.
He said he aspires to be the permanent head of the BID, but concedes the hiring committee was not ready to commit to long-term leadership, given a tentative plan by the BID to hire a consultant to analyze that agency, the Springfield Parking Authority and DevelopSpringfield.
Fyntrilakis – a former School Committee member who is now vice president for community responsibility at MassMutual and has chaired the DevelopSpringfield effort which emerged in the wake of the 2011 tornado - said the three agencies are among economic development shops outside the city’s purview with common missions of downtown development.
“It makes sense to look for overlaps to see how we might collaborate and do better by the downtown,” Fyntrilakis said. "We want to make the BID better, and this might be one way to do that."
While the BID focuses on street clean-up and beautification, its centerpiece is the weekly summertime downtown concerts, which draw thousands of visitors to the downtown. Its budget is approximately $800,000 annually.
The parking authority focuses on parking management and promotions based on events and commerce, including shows at Symphony Hall and new companies that migrate here. Its budget is about $5.7 million.
DevelopSpringfield was spawned in the wake of the 2011 tornadoes and focuses on redevelopment of eyesores in the city, including the River Inn and Gunn Block on State Street, plus building a full-line grocery store in Mason Square. Its annual budget is about $450,000.
Frank Crinella of TD Bank, left and Nick Fyntrilakis of MassMutual talk at the United Way luncheon at the Log Cabin in 2012; both of board members of the Springfield Business Improvement District. Bokul Bhuiya, interim director of the parking authority, said he has no direct knowledge of the BID plans but agrees all agencies with a common goal of economic development must remain vigilant. That agency oversees about 4,500 off-street parking spots in its garages and 1,100 on-street meters for the city.
The parking authority outsources meter collecting and maintenance, among other tasks, but Bhuiya said he is sensitive to merchants’ needs and works to keep rates low.
Fyntrilakis said these three agencies will be targeted in their proposed analysis, but there are several more with economic development missions and healthy budgets that will be excluded. The BID has not yet engaged a consultant.
Fyntrilakis said agencies including Spirit of Springfield, with a $1.3 million budget, which runs events including Bright Nights and the July Fourth celebration, the Affiliated Chambers of Commerce of Greater Springfield, with a $637,000 annual budget, which focuses on business development, the Greater Springfield Convention & Visitors Bureau, with a $1.1 million budget, and the Western Massachusetts Economic Development Council, with upwards of a $3 million annual budget, will not be part of the analysis.
These are functioning outside of the city’s office of Planning and Economic Development.
Kevin Kennedy, chief economic development officer for the city, said he has a staff of 11 and a budget of about $1.3 million. He also has Maureen Hayes as a $125,000-per-year consultant at his disposal. Kennedy said Hayes has worked on the Union Station and State Street corridor projects, as well as other initiatives.
“She’s an expert in federal and state regulations, as well as in urban renewal. She’s all about the details,” Kennedy said, adding that Hayes’ contract is at least 3 years old and is subject to competitive bidding annually.
Kennedy recognizes that the prospective casino has virtually dominated the public discussion of downtown stimulus for two years. MGM has pledged $25 million to the city for infrastructure, traffic, safety, “the betterment of citizens” and economic development costs over two years. So, Kennedy said he wonders what function the BID will serve in terms of clean-up and security.
“In our (casino) host agreement we have a new trash truck and funding for more police on the streets, so I’m not sure why the BID will need to do that. The BID will need to evolve, and we will have to figure out how,” Kennedy said.
Plotkin said he believes the newly created Springfield Central Cultural District, which will overlap with the Business Improvement District, is a more critical step to a downtown rebound than a casino.
“If people are afraid of a perception, or more than a perception, that it’s unsafe to walk three blocks, they won’t come downtown. It needs to be walkable. So even if the casino comes to Springfield, if we don’t have the cultural district, we’ll have an $800 million resort in the middle of a ghetto,” Plotkin said.