Coming to Coast Village Road: A More Welcoming Look and Feel, and FUN!

Things are looking up on Coast Village Road. Not that the area was faring poorly, by any means, but merchants will get a new boost with a newly formed and approved Community Business Improvement District (CBID). This has been in the works for a couple of years, the brainchild of former Coast Village Association President Bob Ludwick, Vice President Trey Pinner, and Marco Li Mandri, a consultant with New City America.

First, a Little Background

The Coast Village Association (CVA) was formed in late 2016, as a voluntary merchant and property owner membership group, to advocate with the city for maintenance and services. They scored wins with holiday decorations and terrific events, like the Taste of Coast Village and Fashion Weekend. The CVA is responsible for the ‘vibe’ in Coast Village Road’s vibrancy.

The problem with voluntary membership groups is ‘free riders,’ businesses that don’t join, but still get the benefits of the team’s work. Thus, voluntary membership groups tend to go away after time, when the core team gets tired of doing all the work and providing all the funding.

Ludwick had been part of the Milpas Association, another business group with a lot of energy in the early 2000s, that peeled back to one to two people, one of whom was Ludwick. California law allows for the creation of a Business Improvement District (BID), where everyone pays in and everyone benefits. The Coast Village Association started working on a BID in 2020, and this June, 79% of property owners voted for formation of it. They’ve just come through the 30-day waiting period to make it official.

Components of the Coast Village Community Business Improvement District

The initial term of the CBID is five years, renewable for up to 20 years. The annual budget is $296,749. The area includes roughly 350 businesses and 500 employees on Coast Village Road. The geographic area is approximately five to six square blocks consisting of 115 parcels owned by 94 property owners along the Coast Village Road and Los Patos Way area.

Next Steps

They’re in the process of forming the new corporation, required for a Community Business Improvement District. It will take 60-90 days, according to Pinner, including creating organization bylaws and forming an interim board. The current Coast Village Association will then go away.

The new interim board will operate for one year to get everything launched and formalized, and then conduct an official election of a new permanent board, voted in by property owners in the BID. Under California law, BIDs are the democratic vehicle for raising funds and governing their uses within a district.

Now for the Exciting Part: What is the Coast Village CBID Going To Do?

Pinner says the team is looking forward to having the budget to provide services the district needs. Here’s the preliminary breakout of how funds will be used:

40% for civic improvements, particularly sidewalks and medians: beautification, cleaning, removing old news racks, and a new flag program tied to holidays and events.

15-20% for safety and security, such as hiring a security company that could patrol multiple properties. Today, some property owners pay for their own security, and they all use different companies. The CBID could see some gains from leveraging economies of scale regarding security. The Hands Across Montecito homeless outreach team, made up heavily of Montecito residents who volunteer and fundraise for the project, has longed for an opportunity to educate the district businesses on how to secure their property, handle mental illness incidents or public intoxication, and how to refer individuals for outreach. The Hands team has had tremendous success at making homelessness rare in Montecito, and when they find someone living without shelter, they get them indoors quickly. What’s been missing is partnership with the business community on Coast Village, so this is a welcome change.

20% would be spent on marketing and placemaking. Pinner would like to see placemaking activities that are easy to replicate, particularly in the medians. Wrapping trees with lights for the holidays is labor-intensive and expensive. Pinner suggests the district could implement up-lighting for trees with changeable colors that keeps it festive, and makes more financial sense.

20% for management and oversight. They anticipate hiring a part-time person to manage the operation, and some office costs.

The Burning Question: What about Ghost Village Road? Long an enormously crowded Santa Barbara and Montecito mass gathering for Halloween, shelved by the pandemic, Pinner says the goal is to make it even more of a great event, like including a haunted house whose proceeds benefit a charity. Probably not in 2022, though, as Omicron variants continue to rage. But definitely in the brighter, more vibrant welcoming future that Coast Village is sailing towards with the new CBID.