Jamie Haight, owner of a dog grooming business on Bank Street, wants his store represented by a BIA.
Jamie Haight says he’s in no man’s land.
Haight owns The Groomer, one of about 15 businesses between Gladstone Avenue and the Queensway, which are not part of a business improvement area (BIA) .
“We’re definitely left to fend for ourselves,” he says. “My landlord’s cool and he’ll stick up for this place but there’s no BIA that looks after me.”
BIAs are associations formed by business owners who band together for stronger representation in the city.
But the names of some BIAs can be ambigious. For example, the Bank Street BIA doesn’t represent all Bank Street businesses, only those between Wellington Street and Gladstone Avenue.
The next closest BIA is the Glebe BIA, with the Queensway as its northern boundary.
The Groomer is located at Bank Street and Arlington Avenue, between the two nearest BIAs.
A BIA helps with marketing, business recruitment, construction and streetscape improvement and seasonal decorations in its designated location. There were 15 different BIAs in Ottawa as of last March.
Haight says he filed a request for the Bank Street BIA to extend its southern boundary to the Queensway “sometime before the construction on Bank started.”
“They had a meeting, from my understanding, about a possible expansion at one point… and I think they voted not to. It is what it is,” he says. “We survive.”
Haight says he doesn’t know if other business owners have also approached the Bank Street BIA with the same request.
Ian Lee, MBA director of the Sprott School of Business at Carleton University, says he believes BIAs are a “positive step forward.”
He says they represent the common interests of the business owners who created them.
“I’ve been a very strong critic over the years of the City of Ottawa but this is one area where I think they did it right,” he says.
“(The city) created an umbrella policy where they would recognize BIAs but then they left the creation of the BIA up to the individual businesses."
When there’s a serious issue pressing on a group of businesses, Lee says they come together to create a BIA.
“If (business owners) don’t want a BIA or feel like they don’t need one, then they won’t have one.”
The city must approve a BIA proposal before it will recognize one.
A management board is then elected from the BIA membership and a member of city council is also required to join.
“I must say I don’t know why the Bank Street BIA stopped at Gladstone. That’s the way it was established originally… in the 1970s,” says Somerset Ward Coun. Diane Holmes, a member of the BIA’s board.
“I assume it’s because BIAs were established on streets that need better programming and the area from Wellington to Gladstone was in most need of beautification.”
According to Holmes, determining whether to extend the boundaries of a BIA is a complicated process.
“Public meetings are held and a majority of the current members of the BIA have to be in favour of the extension,” she says.
“It’s possible to increase the area, there’s legislation that allows for that, but I think for the BIA to do that, they’d have to hear from quite a few of the business.”
Holmes adds that she hasn’t heard of any recent requests from non-represented business owners to redefine the BIA’s boundaries.
If businesses on Bank Street want collective representation, they can apply again to the city, Holmes says.
However, not all business owners in the area are lobbying for BIA representation.
Wilf Laham, who owns Ada’s Diner, says he doesn’t know what a BIA is or what it does, and prefers it that way.
Laham says in the 18 years his business has been on Bank Street, he has not known about or needed the help of a BIA.
"I’ve been able to deal with everything by myself so if we have a problem, we will get rid of it.”
Others, such as David Baker, manager of European Glass & Paint, say it’s not necessary for their businesses to be included in a BIA for the time being.
“To be honest, I’ve never really thought about joining one. The need for it hasn’t come up,” he says.
The Bank Street BIA was unavailable for comment.
In 2008, the Somerset Street Chinatown BIA expanded its boundary from Rochester Street and Bay Street to Preston Street and Bay Street.The new boundaries reflected the changing needs of business owners.