My Idea for an Urban Paradise

Our city government has done virtually nothing with our downtown core for decades. 

Downtown Tacoma still has so many boarded up buildings, vacancy signs and very few people walking around in an area that should be the busiest section of our city.  As Mayor, I would like to lead the way for a positive and innovative change to our downtown core.

We should want to return downtown Tacoma to what it was when we were growing up, and more… a hustling-bustling civic center.  Full of people walking, entertaining, shopping, eating and living.  A walkable downtown where you can live and work and enjoy your life all in one place.  Not to mention, downtown grocery stores and strategically placed food courts. None of what we need has transpired over the years. All we have received from the city officials are all the reasons why they cannot move us forward. It is time to vote for progress, not proclamations and photo ops.

We need to think outside the box and develop intelligently. With architecture that inspires and attractions to enhance and attract tourism.

Downtown Tacoma has so much promise but the current leadership is small-minded and has a tunnel vision focus on other parts of the city, not to mention Special Interets to further their own political aspirations.  I'd like us to expand upon the term "Mixed Use" development. Rather than just building apartments with retail on the bottom floor. We need to evolve with the ever changing needs of the citizens of Tacoma. Business as usual is not so usual anymore. Brick and mortar businesses are not what they used to be, with the evolution of the internet. We’ve got a surplus of empty business space in downtown Tacoma, while at the same time, a shortage of housing. It’s time we started filling up those empty spaces with residential use as well as forward thinking business use.

In the meantime, we’ve got a parking situation in downtown Tacoma that penalizes people for trying to patronize our downtown businesses. Do the fees collected by parking meters garner enough revenue to really make a difference in our budgetary shortfalls, once the expenses are paid? Is that enough to warrant the downtown businesses who are suffering by our city’s less than inviting parking situation? Since it comes at the expense of downtown business owners, I do not believe so. We need to roll out the red carpet for patrons to return to downtown Tacoma.

We have an opportunity as a community to be hands-on with how our city is developed and I want to hear from everyone in Tacoma. All ideas would be welcomed. We basically have a blank slate, in downtown Tacoma.

Let’s create a masterpiece that will be a positive and inspiring example to other cities around the country.