3) Make the city more business friendly to retain existing businesses, attract new ones, and lessen the tax burden on residents.
- Clean up the toxic anti-business policies the city has through legislative action to remove over-regulation, unnecessary moratoriums, and other obstacles to allow for more future economic development in the city.
- Continue Ward 3 Business group to allow for further direct dialogue with business community leaders on a quarterly basis and survey businesses who have left the community to discover ways we could improve in the future.
- Focus on aggressively filling our empty strip malls through legislative tools like a Vacant Property Registration Ordinances (VPRO), which will provide a strong financial incentive to vacant property owners to find businesses for their spaces while keeping residents safe. These are legal in Ohio and have worked throughout the state, notably in Cleveland Heights and South Euclid.
- Keep North Royalton focused on the future. Box stores and strip malls are projected to be less important in the long run than locally-owned small businesses. These should be encouraged both for their economic value and for their unique contribution they make on our community.
- Focus on implementing recommendations from business owners to improve the York Alpha Industrial Parkway to encourage more manufacturing and business that better fit the long-term future of the city.
- Review any economic development types of legislation before city council to make sure it helps foster a business friendly environment that will retain existing businesses, attract new ones, and encourage residents to buy local in North Royalton.
- Focus on ways as a city to promote good-paying jobs we can count on while preserving the jobs we still have.
- Encourage more historic preservation of the community’s historic sites, buildings, and heritage to help attract more tourism and commerce to the city.
- Support the city utilizing more economic development tools such as Tax Increment Financing (TIF) incentives to bring larger mix-use or redevelopment projects to fruition, creating more revitalization districts, Community Development Supplemental Grants (CDSG) from Cuyahoga County’s Casino Revenue Fund, and address issues with current zoning ordinances that do not align with the needs of residents and local businesses.
- Encouraging development and growth that creates a more sustainable tax base and removes the burden from residents; for example neighboring communities like Strongsville and Brecksville each pay less in taxes and receive better services because of their business revenues.
- Push for fiscal responsible solutions to address the fiscal challenges ahead for North Royalton that is fair and sustainable without burdening residents and business owners.
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