September 2016

Posted on September 1, 2016

Downtown Milton Business Improvement Area

 

AGENDA

Board of Director’s Meeting

 

Wednesday, September 14th, 2016

6:30PM

 

 

  1. Call to Order
  2. Review of previous minutes
  3. Declaration of Pecuniary or Conflict of Interest
  4. Treasurer’s Report
  5. Council Report
  6. Executive Director’s Report
  7. New Business – Vacant board seat update
  8. Next Meeting Date:     AGM Wednesday, October 12th at 6:30pm
  9. Adjournment

 

 

 


 

Previous Meeting’s Minutes

Downtown Milton BIA Meeting Minutes

Location: Downtown Milton BIA Office

Wednesday, August 10th, 2016

 

Attendees: Margaret Lara, John Da Silva, Colin Best, Valerie Nicholson, Mike Boughton, Miriam Dorland-Haight, Laurie Chambers

Regrets: Eric Chabot, Sara Bergsma, David O’Connell

 

Action Items Summary:

Laurie: Develop a remaining expense report to actualize the last 6mo of the year

Laurie: Contact Jay’s and have them power wash the sidewalk

John: Finalize the 2017 Budget Recos with Laurie

 

Call to Order: 6:32PM

 

Review of Previous Minutes:

MOTION to accept: Val, Seconded by: Colin

 

Declaration of Pecuniary or Conflict of Interest:

 

Treasurer’s Report: John da Silva

  • We are currently 50% through the budget and ½ of the way though the fiscal year
  • The 2017 budget is currently being projected and will be ready for board review by next meeting

MOTION to accept Treasurer’s Report: Val, Seconded by: Miriam

 

Council Report:

  • Crosswalks :
  • Downtown should be seeing crosswalk at Ivy by the end of August
  • C.Boughton noted that there should also be a crosswalk at James St. as well as this intersection is very busy, and can be dangerous
    • Downtown Study
    • Will be having a public meeting next month; recommendations for opportunity lands identified by Town Staff will be shown
    • Potential park/community gathering space may be suggested for the Restore and Public Parking at Brown and Main St.’s
    • This would have beneficial impact to the above mentioned issues with James St. traffic
    • The Study is now at the CAO level
      • Variance Application Rates
      • Colin will raise the issue of potentially detrimental application rates to Town Council as they have adverse affects on Downtown development
        • Regional Report:
        • September to October will focus on the 2031-2041 “Where do we go from here” as growth rates are to be increased from 40% to 60%

MOTION to accept Councillors’s Report: Val, Seconded by: Miriam

 

 

 

 

 

 

Executive Director Report:

Event Updates

ED Report – July 2016

Membership/Community Engagement

  • We completed our second e-Newsletter campaign: to win two free tickets to the Annual Downtown Milton Taste tours
  • Traffic to the website increased 66% since May
  • We now have a total of 450 email addresses in our data base

 

Event Updates

Car Show – Updated Budget attached below

  • Record number of attendees
  • All sponsors were very happy with the event
  • We can officially report that we came out financially in the black for this event

 

Taste Tours

  • Two simultaneous tours lead by Rebecca and myself are to happen Saturday August 6th – an update on how they went to be given at the meeting

 

Music on Main

  • Every Friday in August, busker style performers will be taking to Main St. in five separate designated stations: MUSE Studio, Knox Church, Ivy Path/community board, Saucy/Gold Dollar, and the parkette on Charles and Main
  • This event is currently tracking as one of the highest community engagement statistics on social media, rivaling DMSF and Car Show 
  • A completely free event for the DMBIA

 

Potential New Event for September: Movie at Mill Pond

  • Webupdate.ca, Halton Radio and Party Cinemas have interest in coming on board to assist in running this event
  • Estimated Cost:
    • 24’ Screen: $1,600 = $1,200 + $400*
    • 12’ Screen: $1,200 = $800 + $400*

(*Flat rate movie licensing cost) 

  • Team will look for sponsorship, however motion to absorb the cost if full sponsorship can not be found

 

Pokémon Go

  • Current promotion going to capitalize on the games popularity
  • Take a picture of yourself while playing the game, and tag Downtown Milton to win a prize
  • Draws people to our FB and Instagram

 

Beautification

Lights

The Lights have come in, and Milton Hydro has been contacted to see if/when available.  No reply as of yet.  Will follow up early next week.

Garden Sponsorship

A total of 5 businesses from both within and outside our membership, have been gracious in sponsoring gardens along Main St.  $500 will cover one week of watering.

 

Beautification Infraction Committee

President of OBIAA has not heard of a BIA with an infraction committee, however will send out an “ask” to all BIAs next week when back from vacation.  Laurie to report findings as they become available.

 

Free WiFi for Downtown Milton

Stratford BIA noted that bringing free WiFi to Stratford City Centre was a Municipal initiative, as the cost is quite exorbitant (Stratford was a million dollar project).

Spoke with Paul West, the contact and lead consultant at Rhyzome.ca who is currently working on other Municipalities, and he kindly gave me this break down (sighting Tilsonbury BIA as a comparison to Downtown Milton in size):

  • An approximate 10-week project
  • $25/30K in equipment
  • $2/3K Programing of equipment
  • $2/3K Installation of equipment
  • $5K in project coordination
  • Cooperation and access to Town WiFi pipe (cost depends on current service)
  • Approx. conservative cost without an onsite consultancy is $50K

 

Zoning and associated non-conforming application fees

Town staff in both Finance (Jennifer in Budget Allocation), and Corporate Services (Sheryl Hill) have been contacted for further comment – waiting on responses.

Jennifer and Sheryl are back from vacation Monday August 8th and 9th respectively

 

Vacancy Rate May 2016:

6.1%

OBIAA Vacancy Average is 9.7%

 

New Businesses this Month:

Illusion Hair Studio – formally Casa Toscana

Bombshell Hair Studio – formally Ooh la la

 

Charles is for sale

Simply Creative is for sale

 

New Business

  1. 1.    Vacant Board Seat
  • Laurie will be reopening the application process with a new deadline of September 12th
  1. 2.    SMART Communities – John
  • Siemens Canada has some very interesting equipment and ideas on how to make communities stronger with new technologies
  • John will invite his colleagues to join us for a special September board meeting
  • Laurie will look into a venue and invite others from the Town and Milton Chamber of Commerce

MOTION to adjourn the meeting (8:30PM): David, Seconded by: Colin

 

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