Example of a Business Improvement District - Mitchell Street – How Much More “Improvement” Can Mitchell Street Tolerate?

An example of a “successful” Business Improvement Distric was presented at a recent meeting of the Bay View Business Association - the Mitchell Street district. For twenty years, the Mitchell Street Business Improvement District has been working its magic, according to the Mitchell Street Business Improvement District representative at the BVBA meeting on May 14, 2009. The picture presented at the meeting is at odds with what can be see by simply driving through the district with one's eyes open.After 20 years of “Business Improvement” the area has gone from marginal to nearly uninhabitable. Twenty years ago, although not exactly thriving, the businesses on Mitchell were surviving. Then came the “improvements”. Traffic on the street was “improved” Oppressive traffic and parking restrictions were enacted, making travel through the area slow and inefficient. The major established businesses have since long folded or fled.

Mitchell Street -- no longer Milwaukee's center for bridal wear. Erv-The Workingman's Friend – no more! Goldman's – reorganized, but finally had to give up and fold. Kunzelmann-Esser – it's gone. Nothing significant in place of these established icons of Milwaukee business. Mitchell Street is now a street where only the government offices are thriving. Walk down Mitchell Street today, maybe the street crime will leave you alone, and you can take your choice of shoestring startup businesses enabled by desperate landlords. Building owners are given the choice between empty buildings, or giving cheap rent to novice startup businesses, none of them notable for their prosperity. This is what Business Improvement has brought to Mitchell Street.