Cuyahoga County Council Grills Downtown Cleveland Inc. Over Renewal of Special Improvement District Business Tax

Ed Eckart, the senior vice president of operations at Downtown Cleveland, Inc., tried to convince County Council on Tuesday that joining the Downtown Cleveland Special Improvement District was a valuable endeavor—and worth the money. Credit: Mark Oprea

Who is ultimately responsible for keeping Downtown Cleveland clean and safe?

The city? Its business owners? The taxpayers across Cuyahoga County?

That argument was very much on display at Cuyahoga County Council on Tuesday afternoon, when six members of Council’s Economic Development & Planning Committee debated, for the third time this year, to what extent—if at all—they should help pay for downtown upkeep through the Downtown Cleveland Improvement District, a collection of dozens of businesses stretching from East 18th Street to the east bank of the Cuyahoga River.

As the district exists today, businesses pay an annual fee, based on their building size and value of their land. It all amounts to about a $5 million per year. That money is then used on a variety of things—keeping sidewalks clean, hiring safety patrol, buying holiday decorations.

Per state law, Downtown Cleveland, Inc., the nonprofit in charge of rallying property owners, has to get the thumbs up of at least 60 percent of all the businesses in the drawn district boundaries to continue the tax. Everyone except churches, state or federal buildings, or anything owned by the city or county.

That is of course if the city or county says otherwise and joins the district to boost the numbers.

In January, Cleveland City Hall announced that their buildings would be a part of the improvement area for the first time since the district was created in 2006. That amounts to, officials reiterated on Tuesday, about 14 percent of district participation—and adding some $3.5 million to the pool over the next seven years.

Which is why it seemed County Council members appeared threatened, or at least pressured, when DCI once again asked for their okay to include them on the list. Even if those county buildings, including the one Council was currently debating from, amounted to just three percent of the pool.

“Here we are carrying the water again,” District 5 Councilman Michael Gallagher said from his seat.

“I don’t mind doing it, because I feel sorry your guys are in a city that doesn’t give a damn about you,” Gallagher added. “But you’re going to use their votes to put you over 60 [percent]. And trying to shame us to give you three [percent] to put you over 60—to tax people that don’t want to be taxed, I guess.”

Gallagher was talking to Ed Eckart, DCI’s senior vice president of operations, who had shown up to Council in place of CEO Michael Deemer to help convince Gallagher and crew to see the value in chipping in to the improvement district.

Confusion was sowed instead.

While Eckart ensured Council that DCI would meet that 60 percent threshold without the county’s buy-in, Gallagher and others went on a fiery defensive, accusing DCI of a kind of bait-and-switch from what Deemer presented to Council back in February.

District 5 Councilman Michael Gallagher spearheaded Council’s criticism of DCI at Tuesday’s meeting, accusing the nonprofit of lacking transparency about its signature count. Credit: Mark Oprea

“The goal has always been to get to the 60 percent threshold to submit our petitions to the city, and that’s what we intend to do again,” Eckart told Council. “Frankly, if the county doesn’t [join], and we submit petitions, the property owners within the district will pay more money.”

“Okay, well, scare tactics aside,” Gallagher quipped, “the reality is, you got to get to 60. At one time in history, you got to 60.”

“We’ve always gotten to 60,” Eckart said.

“Well, why is it so hard now?” Gallagher said. “If you haven’t lost support, why do you need government to put you over?”

DCI declined to disclose to Scene exactly how many business signed on as of Tuesday. They have until the end of March to submit the final petition count.

But it’s safe to say that five years of pandemic-wrought comings and goings has thrown a wrench into what may have been a more self-reliant improvement district before 2020. (After all, this is the first time Cleveland and Cuyahoga have been approached by DCI.)

And a district of a different shape.

In Council’s second meeting on the subject, on February 3, Deemer informed Council it would be signing on to a “reduced footprint.” A district that excludes, for the first time, the Columbus Road Peninsula (due to Metroparks’ recent land purchases), the area south of Erie Cemetery, and select buildings along the eastern and southern edge of Downtown, Deemer said.

A reduced span that made Deemer’s gentle ask last month seem much more dire.

“Specifically, we really believe that the future of Downtown Cleveland is not just a city issue,” he said. “Even not just a county issue. It’s a regional issue.”

But is it? was the essence of Gallagher’s response. If the county signs on, an extra $800,000 or so would flood into the pool used to keep Downtown maintained.

Money that would, Gallagher reminded Scene after Tuesday’s meeting, come from the pockets of county residents. Some that might not even step foot downtown.

“It’s not about the amount of the stipend,” he told Scene. “But we don’t want to force a group of people to pay into this without having a say.”

Council is planning to make their final vote on whether or not to join the improvement district on March 18.