Commercial Real Estate

Outvoted by their fellow Fulton Street merchants and landowners, a bunch of business owners, mostly on the Clinton Hill stretch of Fulton Street, are now threatening to withhold tax payments in their effort to fight the already-approved Fulton Street BID. On Thursday, reports the Brooklyn Paper, opponents of the Business Improvement District, delivered a letter with 70 signatures to Council Member Letitia James threatening civil disobedience. We won’t pay, the letter read. This BID [business improvement district] has left us out. We want a new, democratic vote. Otherwise it’s a battle on Fulton Street. Some merchants claim that the monthly fees imposed by the BID—$80 per month for every 20 feet of street frontage—are too onerous. The Brooklyn Paper, however, suggests another reason: “There’s the fear among some entrepreneurs that it will accelerate gentrification and eventually drive them out of business.” But why do the Clinton Hill merchants fail to grasp the benefits of organizing to improve the safety and aesthetic levels of where they do business when their peers both to the east in Bed Stuy and the west in Fort Greene are overwhelmingly on board with the program?
Clearing the Air on the Fulton BID [Brownstoner]
Fulton BID Approved! Buses Returning Soon [Brownstoner]
Fulton BID Gaining Momentum [Brownstoner]