The Ithaca Business Apocalypse

I've been listening to a load of new music this weekend, including the new Cat Power, Devastations and Destroyer albums, but this seemed like the thing to post this evening.

It nearly broke my heart to walk into Ithaca Books looking like it had been looted. This is probably due largely to my affection for bookstore s in general, I’m sure some people had the same reaction when they saw the Going Out Of Business Sale sign on the bead store.

Tis the season for the GOOBS in Ithaca, it seems to happen in six month cycles that a number of operations shut their door s for good. This time out, we’re losing the bead store, the book store and the deli (although rumor has it Juna’s is itching to get out as well), and maybe it’s only that all of these business are located on the Commons that this seems like a portend of the Ithaca Business Apocalypse.

I feel I’m in something of a position to prophesize doom for business owners in Ithaca, being one of them myself. And there are any number of reasons that a business goes under. The deli, for instance, kept sporadic hours, used less-than-fresh ingredients and was overall sketch. The bead store, well, there’s a lot I don’t know about the economics of beads. But there is one unifying feature of these stores, which is their location on the Commons, which means they all share (or shared) absurd rates of rent.

Rents on the Commons run in the range of $2 per square foot. This varies from location to location, of course, but any spot on the Commons will run you a pretty penny. How many beads do you have to sell to come up with $1000 a month rent? A truckload, give or take.

So what’s to be done? Ithaca is seeing growth, but the growth seems to be occurring in more outlying areas of town, be it the Miracle Mile of big box stores, where a lot of smaller businesses are choosing to carve out niches, or the West End, separated from downtown by a couple blocks. Rents are a little more reasonable out those ways (or, say, just off the Commons on the wrong side of a one way street) and some people are looking at the West End as undergoing the same sort of gentrification seen in outlying areas of larger cities. But the cities in question have already established their central downtowns, whereas our Commons have been struggling economically for at least as long as I’ve been in town.

As it stands, the Commons is pockmarked with vacancies, and this is the first issue that needs to be address, as it is closely paired with the rent issue mentioned earlier. A small start up business can scarcely afford the level of rent demanded by Commons landlords and chain operations have either shown no interest or been discouraged by the city (the exceptions being the Subway and Jimmy John’s, whose operations scarcely helped out the homegrown Lou’s Deli. Or Sadie D’s deli, which closed its doors earlier this year). So the spaces sit open, and when they sit open for long enough, they become tax write-offs for their landlords, many of whom live out of town. Every time you see a yellow –on-black FOR RENT sign, you should hear the sound of blood being sucked out of the economic jugular of Ithaca. And while it doesn’t currently bear such a sign, the most egregious example of this is the stunning and beautiful Masonic Temple that sits vacant waiting from someone to stumble into the money pit Jason Fain has left there.

The city could staunch this bleeding by enacting tax penalties for downtown commercial spaces that sit vacant for more than six months. This would create an incentive, albeit a negative one, for downtown commercial landlords to set rent rates commensurate with the amount of business someone could conceivably do on the Commons. At lower rent rates, these spaces might reinvigorate the Commons with new business rather than serving as a comfortable write-off for absentee landlords.

There are other things. Watch, for instance, the positive effect that an active State Theater has on downtown. Now imagine that the Masonic Temple, which could easily house two music venues, a cultural center or any number of public spaces, was actually in use. Not too long ago, someone tried to provide Ithaca with just that, but was prevented from doing so due to the violations that remain on the liquor license attached to the site. Without a change of ownership, no one will be able to sell booze in that location because of the sheer idiocy of the last renter. Had the city intervene, had the mayor or members of city council written to the liquor board and said that this business would be a cultural and economic boon to the city and that violations seven years in the past by individuals unconnected with the current business should be overlooked in view of the benefits the business would afford the city. I can only hope that if another business owner is brave enough to attempt the same, someone in municipal government has the good sense to vocally support them.

An anchor store needs to be actively recruited, and I know this is going on, so I’m only saying this to support current efforts. Personally, I’ve got little use for an Urban Outfitters on the Commons, but I know a couple universities full of students that might take more of an interest in a UO or an Anthropologie than they did in a bead store. The same kind of sweetheart deals brokered with big box stores should be instituted on a smaller scale to get a national upscale retail store to open up on the Commons.

But before that happens, the Commons themselves need to be cleaned up, and that starts with removing some trees. I know this is Ithaca and we all love us some trees, but folks, we are surrounded by trees. This city has more public park space per block than anyplace I’ve ever been. Stand in a park and throw a rock, you know where it’s going to land? On some kid throwing a Frisbee in another park. Look in any direction, you’re going to see trees. But the Commons is overrun by aesthetically unpleasing trees that block sightlines, filter our the already limited sunlight and house hundreds of starlings, twittering little crap-machines that leave the brickwork filthy. Not to mention the fact that because these are trees unsuited for the middle of a city street, their overlarge root structures buck up bricks and concrete alike. With smaller, manageable foliage, the Commons would look like a city block (which is what the Commons in Boulder and Burlington look like). Paired with the storefront cleanup grant, this would make the entire area more pleasing too look at, brighter and cleaner and more appealing out outside business.

Right now, the trees and the landlords are winning. As young business owners look to outlying neighborhoods without even considering the Commons, Ithaca runs the risk of having a gaping hole in its heart and becoming a loosely strung together collection of satellite enclaves, each struggling to avoid their own business apocalypse.