| Making a Better Place |
With an office and staff in the center Grove, the Coconut Grove BIC (Business Improvement Committee) exists on a day to day basis to make the Village center a better place. The BIC improves the Grove in such areas as parking, lighting, sanitation, marketing, and safety, as well as providing special events. The BIC was formed as an advisory committee to the City of Miami in 2004. It meets monthly and consists of a fourteen-member, stakeholder board which is chaired by City of Miami Commissioner Marc D. Sarnoff.
These efforts by the BIC to improve the Grove are just the beginning. In many respects the BIC is the first stage booster rocket that will lift us up to the next stage of our journey. We are now undertaking a public process involving Center Grove property owners, merchants, restaurateurs, and hotels to establish the Coconut Grove Business Improvement District (BID), a special district to improve the quality and financial success of the Grove commercial core.
The Coconut Grove Business Improvement District (BID)— like more than a thousand other BIDS helping their communities across America—will be a program of self-help through self-taxation and cooperation. The decision to become a BID will be decided by a vote of property owners within the proposed Coconut Grove benefit district.
The future beckons.
|
| What is a BID? |
“A BID is an organizing and financing mechanism used by property owners and merchants to determine the future of their retail, commercial and industrial areas. The BID is based on state and local law, which permits property owners and merchants to band together to use the city’s tax collection powers to “assess” themselves. These funds are collected by the city and returned in their entirety to the BID and are used for purchasing supplemental services (e.g. advertising, promotions, and special events) beyond those services provided by the city.”
___ Excerpted from Starting and Managing a Business Improvement District (New York City Department of Business Service, July 1996)
|
