9 minute read
Downtown Now
THE VOICE OF DOWNTOWN CLEVELAND
DOWNTOWN CLEVELAND ALLIANCE COMMUNITY LEADER
Resilient in the Face of Adversity
DCA’S MICHAEL DEEMER DELIVERS HIS FIRST STATE OF DOWNTOWN ADDRESS.
Michael Deemer, Downtown Cleveland Alliance’s (DCA) new president and CEO, recently took to the podium at the City Club to deliver his first State of Downtown address.
After being welcomed by Kristen Baird Adams, president of the City Club’s board of directors and Dan Moulthrop, CEO of the City Club, Deemer summed up the state of downtown in six words: “Resilient in the face of adversity.”
Naturally, Deemer took time to thank the City Club for supplying the venue and event sponsors PNC and the United Black Fund of Greater Cleveland for their support, as well as the continuing support of the many community partners of DCA. He also took time to thank the staff and board of directors at DCA for their work.
“I would also like to recognize my predecessor, Joe Marinucci, our former CEO, who has been a terrific mentor to me over the years and who has done so much for this organization,” Deemer said.
Deemer, who took the reins as president and CEO of DCA this summer after Marinucci stepped down, also recognized the significant generational change that is taking place both within DCA and the city.
“I would like to congratulate Kevin Kelley and Justin Bibb on their victories Tuesday evening in advancing to the next round of the general election,” Deemer said. “One of them will become the next mayor of Cleveland. And regardless of the outcome, it will continue the generational change that is taking place in our civic culture in Cleveland. I look forward to working with them over the next couple of months and next several years to continue to build our city.”
In addressing the issue of resilience and adversity, Deemer took time to reintroduce the audience to DCA and its mission, while addressing the well-documented challenges posed by the pandemic.
“I will also speak to the legacy challenges that we faced before the pandemic that are still with us today and will be with us afterward,” he said.
As the only nonprofit that serves as the voice and steward of Downtown Cleveland, which has the largest concentration of jobs and is the largest residential downtown in Ohio,
Dan Moulthrop and Michael Deemer
DCA will continue its mission of attracting people, jobs and investment to the city’s core, Deemer said. This is at a time when downtowns across the country continue to face the unprecedented challenges of the past year-anda-half, including those stemming from the global pandemic. “That certainly is the case here in Cleveland, against the backdrop of an extraordinary period of transition and opportunity,” said Deemer. “Picture what comes to mind when you think of Downtown Cleveland. In your mind’s eye, you think of bustling sidewalks, packed sports stadiums and live music and theater, a thriving foodie scene and busy office towers. All of these things in the past year-and-a-half have been in jeopardy.” In Cleveland, the pandemic has caused streets to be quieter. Shops and
restaurants have struggled with staffing and foot traffic. There has also been an uncertainty about the future of office work. The very density on which downtowns across the country thrive has been under attack.
“And those are just the pandemic challenges,” Deemer pointed out. “However, I believe in the strength of this organization. I believe in the foundation we have built in Downtown Cleveland and the momentum behind the revival that was taking place downtown prior to the pandemic, and it has really continued throughout.”
Starting with the NFL Draft held in Cleveland earlier this year, DCA sought to accelerate downtown’s recovery with its Welcome Back to Downtown campaign, which focused on new and old shops and restaurants that were just waiting to welcome workers and visitors back to downtown. The inclusive media campaign, which included social and paid media, focused on the return of events like ball games and theater productions to the city’s core.
“We also reembraced our belief that everything good that happens in downtown comes from having a clean and safe destination,” said Deemer. “We invested in our ambassadors, who work 7 a.m. to midnight, seven days a week, making our community safe, clean and welcoming. They have been on the job as essential workers, so we invested in them to raise starting wages to make sure we had a strong team in place to welcome workers and visitors back to downtown.”
As a part of that clean and safe strategy, DCA launched a co-responder
Congratulations to all the Community Leader of the Year recipients, including our very own John Habat!
pilot project with Medworks, which coupled DCA ambassadors with mental health professionals to respond to calls about people who were experiencing homelessness, mental health or addiction related crises, “and making sure people were being connected with the sheltering services that they needed,” added Deemer.
DCA also amplified its advocacy voice in the past year, getting involved in civic discussions surrounding the city’s mayoral race, publishing a voter education guide and educating downtown voters on how to register to vote, as well as where and when to vote.
“We also published our very first mayoral questionnaire that showed the voters where the candidates stood on issues that were important to downtown voters,” Deemer added.
These efforts have helped downtown in myriad ways.
“Throughout the summer, we saw increasing foot traffic in downtown,” said Deemer. “Compared to the same time in 2020, we have had a 90% increase in foot traffic. We see office workers returning. We see businesses continuing to invest in office space, whether it is Sherwin-Williams moving forward with their plans for a corporate headquarters, CrossCountry Mortgage relocating their corporate headquarters to downtown and bringing 600 jobs with them, or Rocket Mortgage adding 600 jobs to their downtown headquarters.”
There are also new projects on the books that should bring long-term investment and development, such as the new plans from Bedrock to rethink Tower City and the Cuyahoga River waterfront, as well as the projects from the Cleveland Browns and the Haslams to revitalize the city’s lakefront.
“We see business and leisure travel picking back up,” added Deemer. “We see new projects getting under construction and new projects being planned. And, very important from our perspective at the Alliance, our residential population continues to grow.”
Earlier this year, DCA surpassed its goal of reaching 20,000 residents downtown and is now marching toward its goal of having 30,000 residents by 2030.
But the continued growth is not going to happen by itself, said Deemer. DCA needs to do everything in its power to accelerate downtown’s recovery. For that, DCA has developed a three-part plan.
THINKING ABOUT COLLEGE CAN BE OVERWHELMING.
The college access experts at College Now can help your family through every step of the process, from application to enrollment and everything in between - for free!
We're here to help with your family's postsecondary plans. Visit www.collegenowgc.org for more information.
Building a Better City
THREE-PART STRATEGY ENHANCES THE QUALITY OF LIFE, RESTORES DOWNTOWN’S VIBRANCY AND ATTRACTS NEW BUSINESSES.
As a part of his State of Downtown at the City Club last month, Michael Deemer, president and CEO of Downtown Cleveland Alliance (DCA), outlined a three-part strategy to keep the downtown on a growth track. It involves enhancing the quality of life and pedestrian experience, restoring downtown’s vibrancy and “going back on offense in attracting new businesses.”
Enhancing the quality of life starts with creating a clean and safe environment for residents, workers and visitors alike.
“We will be focusing on increasing the visibility and responsiveness of our ambassadors,” said Deemer. “We are going to build on the success of our co-responder pilot project with Medworks to make sure downtown is a model for connecting people experiencing homelessness or crises related to mental health or addiction.”
Restoring downtown’s vibrancy means making it an exciting place to be.
“That begins with bringing workers back downtown,” said Deemer. “We’re doing everything in our power at DCA to encourage that — whether it means encouraging people to get vaccinated or working with employers to identify best practices or how to communicate with their teams to make them want to come back to the office.
— Michael Deemer
Your business doesn’t fit in a lending box. So we got rid of it.
Customized funding solutions designed to scale with you.
For experienced developers, Fund That Flip offers:
• Underwriting customized to your business • No pre-established lending limits • Maximum LTV and
LTV ratios • Competitive rates
Single Family + Multi-Family
New Construction
Fix-and-Rent
Fix-and-Flip
Cash-out Refinance
fundthatflip.com deals@fundthatflip.com (216) 815-8484
“We also know that in order to be successful in restoring downtown as a favorite place, we need to make our downtown a place that people love to be. We need to make it a place that inspires people to choose downtown over dull virtual experiences and 2D ‘Zoom fatigue.’”
How will DCA do that?
“We are going to animate downtown streets, parks and public spaces with arts, activities and energy,” answered Deemer.
In the third part of the strategy, “We are going to collaborate with our strategic partners to communicate with business leaders, entrepreneurs and investors why Downtown Cleveland is a great place to grow a business,” said Deemer.
That will be accomplished by combining data analysis and design into a compelling narrative to show the real story of Downtown Cleveland and all it has to offer.
“Over the course of the summer, we have collaborated with TeamNEO in launching an office attraction marketing project that was focused on the Erieview Historic District,” said Deemer. “We also launched a pilot project for retail attraction that was focused on Euclid Avenue. We’re going to build on those strategies and take them across downtown, and work with partners to attract more businesses, more retail growth for downtown.
“That’s how we will confront the pandemic, and that’s what we will prioritize over the course of the next year.”
Risk & Insurance Leadership Since 1893
Own your next career opportunity and create a meaningful path with Oswald.
An employee-owned company
