City council heard the latest plans of the North Battleford Downtown Business Improvement District for 2021 at their meeting Monday night.
Executive Director Misty Lavertu provided the report on the BID鈥檚 initiatives for the year. Unfortunately, like most activities and organizations in the city, the downtown BID continues to be impacted by COVID-19, with a number of BID initiatives put on hold.
Still, the BID is proceeding with a number of programs and projects for 2021. Lavertu outlined them as follows:
They are moving ahead with their facade improvement grants for 2021. In 2019 they had awarded six such grants and in 2020 had awarded three grants, two of which were completed. They are receiving applications for 2021 and have extended the deadline to the end of May.
As well, they are continuing with the Art Alley project downtown. The latest is a mural painted on the side of Battle River Treaty 6 Health Centre. Lavertu said the artist spent 187 hours creating that particular mural.
A call is out to artists who might be interested in doing more Art Alley projects downtown.
Keeping the city clean continues to be a priority, with the 鈥淐lean Team鈥� out and about downtown to remove the trash and debris. A new team begins May 3 on the streets.
Lavertu also spoke on the 鈥減ocket park鈥� project downtown, with the pocket park being placed in one of the empty lots on 101st Street. She said a focus of the BID is the beautification of downtown, and the hope is to get started on that as quickly as possible.
Lavertu acknowledged some are unsure how it is going to turn out, but said they will monitor it and make adjustments as they go if they face challenges.
Unfortunately, the pandemic restrictions have forced some postponements and cancellations of events. Lavertu said the BID had to cancel the petting zoo for their fall festival. It also seems doubtful the fall festival will proceed, either.
A couple of smaller projects are planned for the summer to keep the businesses 鈥渉opeful and positive and forward thinking,鈥� said Lavertu.
Lavertu acknowledged COVID-19 has had an impact.
鈥淗onestly I really believe that the BID leading into 2020 was on the right track,鈥� Lavertu said. 鈥淲e had some really positive feedback from projects that we had in 2019 and we were very excited about continuing those. Unfortunately, it didn鈥檛 pan out.鈥�
