Better Together

Sebastopol Downtown Association is voting this week on whether to merge with the Chamber of Commerce

Adam Parks of the Sebastopol Downtown Association (SDA) and Sebastopol Chamber of Commerce Director Myriah Volk. This week members of the SDA are voting whether the SDA should merge with the Chamber. (Photo by Laura Hagar Rush)

The Sebastopol Downtown Association and the Sebastopol Chamber of Commerce took another step this week on the path to becoming a single entity.

The Sebastopol Downtown Association (SDA) represents businesses in Sebastopol’s Business Improvement District. It’s a quasi-governmental group funded by a percentage of business license fees from businesses located in Sebastopol’s downtown.

The Sebastopol Chamber is a non-profit membership organization that represents business members from all over town.

On Tuesday evening, leaders of the two organizations held a meeting at the Sebastopol Center for the Arts to lay out their plans to a small audience of local business owners. 

In the past, the Chamber and the SDA had a vaguely competitive relationship, but for the last year, they’ve been working together hand-in-glove, and now they’re taking the legal steps to merge.

The vote

For the SDA that means holding an election to get permission from business owners within the Sebastopol Business Improvement District, who this week will be asked to vote Yes or No on the following motion:   

“That the Sebastopol Downtown Association reorganize under the umbrella of the Sebastopol Chamber of Commerce. Further that the SDA maintain control of the Business Improvement District monies collected for support of our members by having approval and veto power over how those funds are spent through the existing SDA board of directors. And finally, that the SDA and the Chamber continue to pursue the expansion of the Sebastopol Business District to include all businesses within the town of Sebastopol. This will include the dissolution of the SDA as it exists, and a new entity called the Sebastopol Business Association would be formed.”

If a simple majority of the SDA’s member voters vote Yes, the motion will pass. (That’s 50 percent-plus-one of those members who vote in the election.)

SDA Members have until Tuesday, Dec. 5 to cast their vote. The SDA will send out an email to all their members today, with an explanation of the proposal, the motion and a request for a Yes or No vote. Members will return their vote by email.

If you are a member of the SDA and you don’t receive this email, contact SDA President Adam Bulbulia at sebastopoldowntown@gmail.com.

Why combine?

There are several reasons for the merger. The first is that it’s simply too confusing to have two competing business organizations in town, representing overlapping territories.

Another problem is that the SDA is chronically underfunded for its mission of supporting downtown businesses. The city pays them just $8,000-$10,000 a year from a percentage of business license fees.

It had always been a goal of the SDA to have a paid director—something they could never afford. By merging with the Chamber they get to take advantage of the executive prowess of Myriah Volk, the new(ish) director of the Chamber of Commerce. Volk has been in the job for a year now and has proved wildly successful at both recruiting new members and getting disparate parts of the town (the SDA, the Barlow, the Chamber) to start working together.  

“When I first started my job at the Chamber, just over a year ago, one of the first things that I observed was the disjointedness with the Downtown Association, with the Barlow, and it's not just me observing this—it was throughout the community that this was spoken about and if an election was coming up, a lot of the candidates would talk about, ‘Oh, well, no one's working together.’ And so one of my goals was to bring people together if I could,” Volk said. “And so we started these meetings with leadership from the Barlow, someone from the city, someone from SDA and the Chamber. And what I found was that there really was a yearning for collaboration. It just hadn't happened. And now it has happened. So if anyone comes to you with that old narrative that no one's working together, it's not true anymore.”

North, East, South, and Downtown – and eventually the whole town

Initially, the SDA will be like a committee representing the interests of downtown businesses in the Chamber.  

“The idea behind this is that the SDA as it exists today, will simply fall under the umbrella of the Chamber of Commerce,” SDA board member Adam Parks said. “The monies that are collected for the SDA will stay under our purview. So we will be the committee—the board as it exists right now—will be able to say  yay or nay to the expenditure of that money.”

Eventually though, as you read in the motion above, the goal is to expand the business district to encompass the whole town.

When that happens, Parks said, there will be committees representing different business districts around town. The Barlow will be part of the East Sebastopol District; the antique shops and other stores at the south end of town will be part of the South Sebastopol District. Ditto for the north end of town. And each one of them will be represented by their own committee within the Chamber.

When the business district expands, the old SDA will be replaced by the city-wide Sebastopol Business Association (SBA). More businesses will mean more business license money for the SBA. Since there are roughly 750 licensed businesses in town, the new SBA will probably reap about $60,000 annually, which the Chamber—with the guidance of the SBA—can use for events or to market Sebastopol as a place to play, explore and shop.  

“I just want you guys to know that I feel that this is really, really important,” said Andrea Caron, the owner of Silk Moon, who was present at Tuesday’s meeting. “For the first time, I really feel hopeful. This is going in a great direction.”