The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Looking for incentives to stimulate business
Just like a late-month snowstorm in April, you can pretty much be guaranteed that when a business comes to town or wants to expand, the owner will complain about the so-called payment-in-lieu fees Crested Butte charges for parking spaces.
Depending on the type of business, the square footage of the building and the location, the town requires business to either provide physical parking spaces or pay $13,000 per required space into the town parking fund, which is then used to help provide parking.
The charge is usually seen as an onerous businesses expense and in the past has been used as an excuse to forgo expansion of some local businesses. So at least one councilperson wants to give business owners a break in the hopes it might stimulate some expansion.
Jim Schmidt said he had toyed with the idea of a “fee holiday” for payment-in-lieu fees for the next year. But after talking to town staff and some fellow council members, Schmidt decided there would be too many problems with a blanket holiday from the fees.
“Maybe we could consider a one-year holiday for the first two payment-in-lieu spots,” he suggested. “The idea is for it to be a stimulus. It might provide an incentive for some more building. It could be worthwhile doing it.”
Councilperson Dan Escalante agreed that the idea of some sort of stimulus was worth pursuing. “Let’s put together a subcommittee and come up with some ideas to look at a fee holiday or some other ways to perhaps stimulate some business,” he said.
Mayor Leah Williams was more cautious. “I have some real concerns over what the unintended consequences might be,” she said. “Resort communities use this sort of tool for a reason. There might be some other ideas out there but not just this. Maybe this committee can come up with other incentives.”
Schmidt, Escalante, Williams and councilperson Reed Betz will get together to bat around ideas of how to provide incentives to stimulate business in a down market.
