This is why so many people hate the ByWard Market District Authority | Opinion

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People were out and about in the ByWard Market on a recent weekend. Photo by Ashley Fraser /POSTMEDIA

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Businesses, then, are represented through a Business Advisory Committee (BAC), the members of which are selected by the board. Williston says the committee’s terms of reference were revised after she became executive director to broaden its representation of retailers, restaurants, service providers and property managers.

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On paper, that seems reasonable. The question is whether it’s functioning as intended.

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When it was first set up, the BAC was made up of seven members. But the majority of them have left and it’s now reduced to three.

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Chateau Lafayette general manager Deek Labelle chaired the old ByWard Market BIA and became the inaugural chair of the BAC when the ByWard Market District Authority was created.

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“It was supposed to be collaborative,” she said. “But from the beginning they were trying to prove themselves and didn’t really want anybody’s opinion. We’d already gone through everything they were trying to learn, and instead of learning from us, it just fell apart.”

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Eventually she resigned from the BAC out of frustration. “It felt like we weren’t going to get anywhere.”

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La Bottega owner Pat Nicastro is one of the remaining three BAC members. He, too, was enthusiastic when the BMDA was proposed.

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“It sounded like a great idea,” he recalled. He envisioned a one-stop shop where businesses could deal with a single organization instead of being bounced from one city department to another.

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Three years later, he says the promise hasn’t materialized.

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“Not much has changed, to be honest,” he said. “We get an email saying this is what’s happening. We need consultation before things happen.”

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Like Labelle, Nicastro had supported replacing the old BIA. Asked whether, knowing what he knows today, he’d still make the same choice, he replied: “I’d keep the BIA. One-hundred per cent.”

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Brian Lahey, co-founder of The Properties Group that owns and manages a number of commercial buildings in the Market, also backed the creation of the BMDA. He expected something resembling the governance model of Vancouver’s Granville Island — a single organization with the authority and expertise to guide the district’s future.

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“What we got,” he says, “was nothing like that.”

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Instead, he sees an organization focused on implementing a pre-existing vision — The ByWard Market Public Realm Plan — without enough input from people on the ground.

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He doesn’t criticize the BMDA’s ambition, but thinks it doesn’t make use of the people who understand how the Market works.

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“There’s a wealth of knowledge that’s available for free,” he said. “They have to consult with the business community that knows.”

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Merchants and property owners aren’t alone in their concerns.

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Former Lowertown Community Association president Sylvie Bigras contrasts residents’ relationship with the BMDA with that of the neighbouring Downtown Rideau BIA.

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“The Rideau BIA lets us know — this street is closing, this event is coming, here’s what’s happening. They consult with us all the time and ask us for opinions. We don’t have that in the Market.

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“The BMDA needs to restructure,” she adds. “It needs to include businesses’ and residents’ voices.”

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Victoria Williston, the executive director of the ByWard Market District Authority, poses in a file photo. Photo by Tony Caldwell /POSTMEDIA

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Williston says that the BMDA does communicate with the community — directly by email to its tenants in the city-owned 55 ByWard and 70 Clarence St. properties, and to the larger business community through an e-newsletter and physical copies it delivers by hand. Feedback, she adds, can be submitted through a form on its website.