While this year’s Sidewalk Days should continue as usual, Moose Jaw Downtown Business Improvement District (BID) chairman Dale Harvey said a recent city council committee decision could put into question the organization’s ability to host the event in future years.
“I think it was a poorly judged move,” Harvey told the Times-Herald on Wednesday.
During Tuesday’s budget committee, a majority of councillors and the mayor voted to cut Downtown Business Improvement District (BID) funding in 2010.
Currently, the city funds BID with $18,827 a year. At Tuesday’s meeting, Coun. Dawn Luhning (former council representative on BID) said BID has become almost exclusively an event organizing committee and has moved away from its original purpose of downtown enhancement.
Luhning said funding cuts will give the BID board the opportunity to review what it does in the community. She added BID has saved a lot of money over the years from leftover cash from the city’s annual grant, so cutting the group’s funding in 2010 will not mean disaster for BID and its annual events.
For more on this story, read an upcoming edition of the Times-Herald.
