Lake Worth Beach will pay a commercial real estate brokerage to attract higher-class shops to the middle-class city's half-vacant downtown.
The Community Redevelopment Agency will contract with West Palm Beach-based Anderson & Carr to recruit "boutique entertainment," "artisanal concepts," shops and restaurants to Lake and Lucerne avenues. The agency will pay the firm up to $175,000. All five CRA board members approved the one-year deal on Oct. 13.
"No offense to vape shops and smoke shops — I'm sure they're really great — but we do have quite a bit, and it would be really nice to have some more places to shop," CRA Executive Director Joan Oliva told the board.
Anderson & Carr is tasked with persuading businesses in places such West Palm Beach,
Delray Beach and Boca Raton to open branches downtown. The firm also plans to look beyond Palm Beach County to places such as Tampa Bay to pitch companies on the small city of 44,000.
Representatives for Anderson & Carr told board members they would like to make Lake Worth Beach a destination by attracting restaurants featuring international chefs.
'Land-banking' concerns rise as Lake Worth leaders see empty storefronts
Anerson & Carr's contract says strategy to fill downtown Lake Worth Beach includes making a database of downtown's vacant commercial properties, hosting up to two trolleybus tours for "VIP" prospective businesses and telling commercial landlords about "reasonable expectations to minimizing artificially prolonged vacancies."
The length of time that storefronts stay empty has become a sore spot for some city officials. They speculate that many sport "For rent" signs because their owners are holding out for wealthier tenants, to the point of "land-banking" the downtown's commercial space.
"We have certain landlords that are land-banking here in Lake Worth because they are doing so well in all these other places and they need a (tax) shelter," CRA board member Greg Richter, a Realtor with Illustrated Properties, said Sept. 8.
City Commissioner Sarah Malega, who owns Zoo Gym on Lake Avenue, also accused commercial property owners on Aug. 11 of the practice.
A landlord whom Malega did not name bought a shop in a part of the city she represents, and told her "this is not in our five-year or ten-year plan."
"So what that tells me is he's buying land everywhere and land-banking in the city of Lake Worth Beach, and that is the real problem," Malega said.
One of the city's biggest landlords balked at the idea that they keep buildings vacant for profit. City officials should have contacted commercial property owners before spending money on Anderson & Carr to do so, said Ariana Peters of the Peters family, led by Doug Peters.
"Every landlord would rather collect rents rather than take a loss by leaving a building empty," Ariana Peters said, adding that the rent they lose out on for a vacant property outweighs potential rent hikes, and that the U.S. tax code offers better ways to help property owners than through vacant holdings.
"When people from the (City) Commission and/or the keyboard warriors drive around the city and see 'For rent' signs, they also need to do simple due diligence, as most of our signs and other landlords at many times are on occupied buildings and/or leases that are up for renewal, or a few months away from expiring," she said.
Lake Worth Beach's new slogan celebrates city's quirks
The Anderson & Carr contract is the latest effort by Lake Worth Beach officials to revive its downtown, where vacancies spread following the coronavirus pandemic.
The CRA approved a $260,000 contract with Miami Beach-based marketing firm Jacober Creative for an advertising campaign.
That campaign will include community surveys about the city; focus groups;, meeting with business owners; helping write press releases and social media posts; and making a website and downtown map with restaurants and other attractions, postcards, window-wrap advertisements, pro-Lake Worth Beach T-shirts, banners, print ads and wraps to cover windows of vacant storefronts.
CRA board members renewed Jacober's contract on Oct. 13, the same day they unanimously approved adopting a new tagline the firm had worked on for its latest marketing campaign, "Lake Worth Beach: Off-center, just perfect."
The slogan will be featured on signs, window decals, wearable materials, car decals and other materials people either can wear or feature on their shops or cars downtown.
Email news tips and article ideas to Chris Persaud at cpersaud@pbpost.com.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Empty downtown storefronts push Lake Worth to recruit new merchants
