DDA recognized for making a difference
Authority one of six nationally honored for work helping businesses through pandemic
Royal Oak’s Downtown Development Authority is one of only six communities nationwide recognized by a national organization for helping local businesses survive the grim challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The DDA is also the only one in Michigan to have gotten the honor, called the Main Street Forward award, from Main Street America.
Main Street America has helped revitalize older historic commercial districts for four decades. It is part of a network of over 1,600 communities and part of a subsidiary program under the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
Royal Oak’s DDA got the recognition for two efforts it set up to help downtown shops, retailers, bars and restaurants in the early months of the pandemic.
DDA leaders first set up a direct grant effort to funnel $1.1 million to local businesses, then gave away $400,000 for its Downtown Dollars e-gift card program to keep shoppers and diners coming to town.
DDA Manager Sean Kammer
said the grant program last summer went to 92 businesses.
“The grants started last June and the last round went out in July last year,” he said, adding some grants were delayed while businesses closed and were disbursed after they reopened.
The grants ranged from $4,000 to $32,000 each and were aimed at businesses with 50 or fewer employees.
Called the Rebound Royal Oak Small Business Assistance Program, the grants had more impact than any other effort by the city’s DDA, Kammer said.
Restaurants and other downtown businesses were on the ropes financially after the state-ordered shutdown in March 2020. Many bars and restaurants worked to get by on take-out business. Some of them closed for good or went up for sale — but the vast majority didn’t.
The DDA focused on giving grants to business owners committed to remaining in the district.
Some owners closed for a short time before reopening.
Chef John Prepolec of the former Mr. B’s Gastropub, used down time to do construction and later reopen as a new restaurant, Alchemi on Main Street.
“The owners got to use the grants for whatever business related expenses they were facing,”
Kammer said. “The money could be used to pay back rent, hire staff or to pay their employees and other costs.”
John Bry, coordinator for the Main Street Oakland County program, said in a statement the Royal Oak DDA’s quick response resulted in many businesses being saved.
“The leadership of the (Royal Oak) DDA serves as a model and inspiration for other Main Street Oakland County communities and downtowns everywhere in times of crisis,” Bry said.
The DDA’s e-gift cards were first offered last summer. Starting last summer, people who signed up for the DDA’s consumer enewsletter at VisitRoyalOak.com each got a $20 gift card, known as Downtown
Dollars, to use at more than 70 restaurants, retailers, coffee shops, salons and entertainment venues.
“The gift card program was to get customers back in the habit of shopping in our downtown,” Kammer said. “Since we started it has had almost a $1 million impact” on business in the downtown.
The Downtown Dollars program is expected to continue through the DDA’s next budget year.
Kammer said there are now 75 businesses in the district that accept the egift-cards.
The cards are still available at VisitRoyalOak.com.
“We have a fantastic DDA that had the business owners’ interests at heart and worked hard to get this done,” he said.