It has come to my attention that the Town of Brookline Efficiency Initiative Committee’s final report recommends the elimination of the position of Commercial Areas Coordinator and that the Town Administrator’s Office FY2010 Financial Plan recommends cutting the position to half time.

Wow!  I firmly believe that it would cost, rather than save, money to the Town of Brookline to cut that position. I am personally familiar with examples of how in a single fiscal year the position of Commercial Areas Coordinator generates, and facilitates ideas, deals, and events that at minimum pays for her own salary and arguably generates money in excess of that.  All I can think is to wonder if either of these planning groups solicited any perspectives from the business community that this involves.  I noticed that in both documents the First Light Festival is mentioned as something to be preserved with mentions of paying an outside event planner as much as $20,000 to make it happen.  Gee, if you cut the position to half time to save $30,000, then hire an event planner for $20,000 for that single event you are only now saving $10,000?  What about all the other functions that may have to be outsourced as well?

First Light is certainly a nice public event, But if the town puts a value of $20,000 on this single days event, I can only assume that if they were aware of the relative magnitude of what the position of Commercial Areas Coordinator accomplishes the other 364 days of the year they would value the position at millions of dollars annually!  It is also not a position that can be accomplished half time.  The performance of the position is all about ongoing communication, often on time sensitive issues as they play out, and requires appearances at constant meetings between so many parties that it is hard to see how that activity could be restricted to only certain days and hours and remain effective.

First Light must have made it to the radar screen of the Efficiency Committee became of the highly visible nature of the project.  Yet ironically, most of the time the net effect of a job well-done for the town’s Commercial Areas Coordinator is to have no public or media attention whatsoever.  A job well-done results in bad news that gets averted and never makes it into print!  It results in businesses that do get along with landlords, so they stay in town and don’t flee to more receptive communities.  It results in businesses that simply stay in businesses, continuing to enrich the town thorough their contribution of personal property taxes, the real estate taxes that flow thru their lease payments, and the extraordinary level of private giving to the many town nonprofits that are the beneficiaries of the community involvement and generosity that Brookline business are known for.  It also results in a continuous stream of new businesses that do successfully establish here in town because there is someone to help them navigate the choppy waters involved in establishing a successful business.

I believe I have a unique perspective as a small business owner who has done business in the town of Brookline for 26 years.  26 years ago there was no Office of Economic Development or Commercial Areas Coordinator.  When my wife and I started doing business in Brookline the process of interfacing with the many various agencies and departments of the town was a daunting and complicated affair.  A bit like arriving at the gates of a castle with a deep moat and the drawbridge up.  It took a lot of determination, patience and persistence, in dealing with a town bureaucracy that seemed to almost pride itself on obfuscation and an adversarial approach in “assisting” businesses with matters pertaining to planning, building, licensing, public works, etc.   I always felt businesses were looked upon as some sort of leeches on the town, trying to get away with something.

Of course nothing could be further from the truth, as we all know Brookline is home to a vital and dynamic business community that boasts a higher than average assortment of independent (non-chain and locally owned) stores, services and food establishments.  We all also know that is a major part of what attracts so many residents and customers to Brookline.  Without a healthy business community property values decline, tax revenues, licensing revenues, meter parking revenues, all decline which leads to lesser town services which of course cycles back to lower property values and even more diminished town services.

When the town created the Office of Economic Development, and then the position of Commercial Areas Coordinator, everything changed dramatically for the better.  To be blunt, the attitude shifted from, “get out, you are bothering us you little gnat” to “how can we help you and challenge you to realize your full potential as a contributing integrated part of this community?”  Now there was a single point person to assist the 1400± businesses of Brookline to navigate the bureaucratic waters.  To assist businesses in determining the appropriate departments and agencies that could meet their needs, to educate businesses on the proper ways in which to interface with the town that would result in win-win situations for all.  To actively encourage and assist the kind of businesses the town recognizes help shape the unique character of Brookline. To share the vision of the generous culture of Brookline business in how they in turn support the town and its many worthy non-profits. To proactively act as a mediator, negotiator, referee, and advocate when businesses face challenges in dealing with landlords and regulatory departments and agencies within and outside of the town.  To protect the residents of the town when businesses fail to understand the unique requirements of fitting in as a good neighbor to our special town.

Businesses pay the higher side of a split tax rate in this town yet garner zero direct return from the half of the taxes that go to our school systems budget.  We pay a business property tax in addition to real estate taxes and a host of fees and permit charges. In every way we are taxed more heavily than residents.   I could list many examples of ways in which the taxes business pay go significantly further towards funding all town activities since business pay more for every town subsidized service such as parking and trash collection, yet cost nothing like the spending that the average resident does in services.  It is my impression that the town does and should find it appropriate to encourage a healthy and growing business community in the town even if all they care about is the financial picture and nothing else.  And all the businesses are asking for here is a single town employee to help coordinate the activities of these 1400± entities with the town.  We are not asking for an entire department; no heavy machinery, just one employee to act as a liaison.  It’s done SO much good from the perspective of those of us who were here before and after the position was created!

I have seen it both ways:  Without an office of economic development and with one; and I can assure you that that the big chain stores that are so often characterized as what we enjoy NOT having too many of in Brookline, are who will always manage to successfully navigate the process of doing business in this town because of their access to expensive and aggressive legal teams to handle all issues related to ramming through planning, permitting, zoning, taxation, resident complaints, issues, etc even when to the detriment of the character of the town.  The landlords who are greedy and have no civic minded responsibility who are happy to have storefronts sit empty and simply collect tax write-offs on them will also be winners here with no town employee charged with keeping up the pressure on them to act in a civic minded manner.  All these players will win at the expense of the vitality of our business districts, and the independent, wonderful, small and medium sized business that so desperately need this minimal assistance of a single town employee whose job it is to act as a facilitator for all that they do, will be the ones who suffer.

Is there, or is there not a commitment to assisting Brookline's commercial areas in remaining vital?  No one is talking about eliminating the position of Economic Development Officer who assists big new development projects facilitating appropriate development by working with developers during the complex and lengthy public approval process. Advocating for zoning changes when needed. Preparing guidance materials for developers seeking to navigate the process.  But it would appear that once the major development projects are complete that the town is planning on reneging on its in its commitment for continued stewardship of the new business that is brought in.  To only focus on bringing in large new retail/office/hotel/ development but to offer no long term stewardship of these new taxpayers, citizens, and contributors to our community once they are “landed” seems to be indicate we are not willing to insure the success of the very development we are paying to encourage.  Without long-term stewardship of the right kind of business here in Brookline why do we ever want to bother increasing business in Brookline?  I have been operating in this town for 26 years and employ 30 people, half of them Brookline residents.  Why can the town afford the position of someone to lure in new business yet not to support my existing contributions in any way?  Isn’t it always easier to retain a good situation than to build it from scratch?

The town’s website says the purpose of the Office of Economic Development is “to foster a common agenda among store owners, commercial landlords, and neighborhood residents.”  I suppose that part of the OED Office’s mission statement will have to deleted.  Here is a recent example of how the Commercial Area Coordinator did perform that mission just recently and also yielded in one fell swoop an annual income for the town that alone in this single project paid for her entire position and will continue to year after year:  When the Transportation board and police and selectmen wanted to raise ticket fines and start ticketing for the 2 hour rule more aggressively in order to address the concerns of residents to unblock their streets AND to raise significant ticket revenue for the town (which is now referred to in the 2010 budget as being expected)  an unexpected consequence was the fear on the part of merchants that their employees would be “taxed” out of being able to work in Brookline by the ticketing.  Although the merchant community and the police force representatives, and the towns transportation department and board went through months of acrimonious debate leading to stalemate after stalemate on the issue it was Marge Amster, Commercial Areas Coordinator, who sheparded the parties to an agreement that ultimately satisfied the fears of residents, the concerns of the police and transportation department, and the merchants.  The result:  no more cars parked on the streets than before, yet now the town collects in excess of $100,000 a year on parking permits purchased by the business community that have an extremely minimal administrative cost to manage, freeing the police to ticket actual out of town scofflaws instead of local business employees, racking up even more revenue for the town on top of the permit revenue.

This is just one example of the sort of work Marge does week after week all year long. Quietly and behind the scenes engaging business owners, town officials, local landlords, and residents, who are at war over situations that normally arise from time to time with the financial and space issues common to urban areas such as ours, and finds common ground that often results in cost savings to business and the town alike.  To see her job as simply the event planner of First Light is dismissive and offensive to those of us who have seen the success with which she has consistently dispatched the true duties of the Commercial Areas Coordinator.  It displays a lack of understanding of the complexities of the situation.

I just looked at the list I maintain of organizations I donate to on a regular basis.  It is over 100 organizations long; yet about half of them are in Brookline.  I have copied in a partial list below of Brookline organizations.  I know that many other businesses donate to as many or significantly more organizations.  The business community always comes out and responds heavily when there is a need in the town whether it is a call from the food pantry or support for the teen center currently under development.   Please don’t underestimate how much of this culture of goodwill from the business community has been generated by the town’s Office of Economic Development’s longstanding efforts to spread an understanding of this culture of giving as well as to meet our needs when they arise.  Brookline has become such a kinder and gentler place to do business over the years I have been here and I believe the result has been a financial boon for all the players: residents, schools, nonprofits, and the businesses themselves.  Lets keep it going forward.

It appears that some advisory board members strongly believe that the town should adopt a classic Laissez Faire policy towards economic development and support of the town’s business community.  But you can’t have your cake and eat it too:  the town already has a long established a deep-rooted philosophy ofactively shapingthe character and tenor of its business community and all business development.  The town has always made an unequivocal point about controlling business in this town in order to preserve and perpetuate all that we hold dear about our historic muddy river hamlet.  So if you are going to continue to regulate businesses more heavily than surrounding communities, it would be only seem decent to maintain the position of a town employee who assists in the navigation of all this very UN- Laissez Faire policy.  If you really want to go Laissez Faire, and let the market decide which businesses are left standing in Brookline with zero assistances from the town, you better be ready to accept that its not all going to be friendly local merchants who do things like heavily contribute to town causes and institutions who will be the ones left standing when all day to day assistance is stripped from the equation.  Some members of the Advisory Board have in the past written in the Brookline Tab about the evils of all us greedy Brookline businesses that don’t pony up enough tax dollars to the town.  If those individuals truly believe that Brookline’s present truly wonderful business community represents a bunch of evil businessmen just milking the poor residents of Brookline as a convenient cash cow, they are in for a strong dose of unpleasant reality when Brookline abandons its recent approach of supporting the positive community we have in a single misguided move to simply save the town 30,000 dollars a year.  Then maybe we will all really find out what truly greedy landlords and large businesses can be capable of.  Personally I would rather that Brookline continue its strong tradition of actively shaping and supporting the amazingly decent and human business community that we are all so proud of.

You know we in the business community do NOT take a Laissez Faire approach to our role as community members of Brookline.  We take a sincere and active caring nurturing approach.  We spend a lot of time and money and energy on it and we take it very seriously.  If the town wants to send a big message that you are turning the eye of Laissez Faire economics towards us... do you do so with the understanding that the resources we currently spend on our community responsibilities may need to be necessarily diverted to the task of simply surviving in this brave new world of yours?

By the way, over the past few years I have received many calls from the economic development offices of towns in Massachusetts with offers of town negotiated (or even town subsidized) rents with landlords willing to donate improvements and a promised streamlined regulatory process if I were to agree to move my business to their towns where they are seeking to revitalize their towns commercial districts with the vision of something along the lines of Coolidge Corner.  I get these calls all the time.  Closer to home, I was even approached and heavily lobbied to move to Brighton Center recently! Other cities and towns are spending big bucks to form economic development plans to lure in existing business like the sort we already have here!  They are taking an active role in trying to reshape their communities to be more like ours already is!  Is that what we are going to be doing ten years down the road after we realize what a mistake it was to gut our economic development efforts here in Brookline?

Was it Joni Mitchell who said “...you don’t realize what you got till it’s gone.”  Please consider these thoughts when deciding about the elimination of the position,

Sincerely,

Abram Faber,

Brookline Resident & Co-Owner; Clear Flour Bakery, inc.