We have the largest, and arguably the best, historic downtown: beautiful architecture, delicious restaurants, historic squares, walkable paths, festivals, nightlife, museums, shopping and a million other reasons we all love to come downtown and see the heart of Savannah.
But, is there a part of you that feels like it could be a bit better?
With our buzzing metropolis and our thriving tourism community, we have a downtown that has more foot traffic than any other area in this region. With this number of people, it can mean more issues with which residents, visitors and businesses must contend.
It’s more difficult to keep sidewalks clean, trash picked up and buildings maintained with a bevy of activities, festival, concerts and all the other reasons why we love going downtown.
It’s more difficult to create a feeling of safety when opportunistic criminal activity flourishes in an environment where people congregate.
It’s more difficult to uphold our reputation of being the “Hostess City of the South” if no one is leading the effort. More people, residents and visitors alike, tell me it’s not very inviting to come downtown. “It doesn’t feel like the South. It doesn’t feel as friendly as it should,” said a friend of mine.
For all of these reasons, I’m glad city officials and community leaders have banded together to create a program that will be a game changer for downtown Savannah.
You may have heard of it. Savannah Serves is an ambassador program where teams of people will help city services, already in place in some cases, keep residents and visitors feeling safe, clean and welcome.
Right now, it’s being proposed as a public-private partnership billed to enhance the downtown visitor and resident experience in the area of downtown where to-go cups are allowed.
The program will comprise ambassadors or hosts on foot walking through the service area where to-go cups are allowed. Hosts will assist residents, visitors and business people with information, useful services, and act as additional eyes and ears for public safety.
Each of these hired hosts will serve on red, green or blue teams.
The red team will create a sense of welcome. They will be skilled in customer service and armed with information. They’ll be walking up and down the streets seven days a week from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m.
If you have a dead battery, a member of the red team can help you get back up and running. If a visitor can’t find a restaurant on the now infamous “Abercrombie” Street, a member of the red team can help.
The green team will keep everything clean. They’ll provide eyes and ears on the street alerting crucial city departments of physical conditions that may endanger citizens and visitors. Where they can fix something, they will go ahead and fix it.
The blue team will add a sense of security. This will be dozens of off-duty police officers paid to help out in high traffic pedestrian areas. They will patrol our streets on foot and bicycle and increase the presence of uniformed officers on our streets.
In the proposal, each of the team members will be highly visible and uniformed throughout the service area and can provide information to visitors and citizens that are exploring the sights and sounds of downtown.
If we, as a community, are not successful implementing this program, our downtown will be status quo. We could lose our distinction of being hospitable. We could struggle with keeping our sidewalks and squares clean and pristine. We could feel less than safe in an area that reportedly attracts criminal activity.
I do not want that to happen. This is why I’ve stepped up to support this program as a means to improve our community.
You may be wondering how it will be funded. There are several options on the table, but the one that looks most promising is what’s being proposed — and it has received wide support from residents, business owners and community leaders.
In this proposal, a 25-cent flat fee will be collected, per transaction, under the following guidelines: The transaction takes place in the service area, the transaction is charged state sales tax and the pre-sales tax total is greater than $5.
A report from the city of Savannah Revenue Department projects that 70 percent of the fees would be paid by tourists. That means when a tourist eats lunch downtown, 25 cents will be tacked on. When a resident buys a car on Broughton Street, a 25-cent fee will be tacked on.
One quarter could be a game changer for downtown Savannah. I hope you’ll join me in supporting the program. This is a community-led project, and we want to hear from you. Join the discussion at www.SavannahServes.com, and let’s talk about how we can make this a reality.
Michael Owens is President/CEO of the Tourism Leadership Council. Read about other community partners and how you can voice your opinion at www.SavannahServes.com.