Tuesday  the  City's Downtown Development  Authority Board conducted  its annual meeting, and elected Larry Rochon as its Chairperson and James Reid, II as  its Vice Chairperson and set its 2011 regular-meeting schedule for 7:00 P.M., the third Tuesday of each month, as sessions are necessary.

Immediately following the annual meeting of the Downtown Development Authority Board, the same membership then convened the annual meeting of the City's Downtown Management Board and selected Mr. Rochon and Mr. Reid as the Management Board's officers and approved the same third-Tuesday meeting schedule for 2011; and heard the Downtown Director report concerning 2010 annual statistics for the downtown and further considered and tabled until its February 15 meeting, the establishment of its Downtown Development Authority District as a Project Area under Public Act 501 of 2006 for purposes of making liquor permits available to downtown restaurants who make qualifying capital investments in their businesses.

On February 16th the Downtown Management Board met to consider the following routine business:

(1) Accepted a Design Committee report that noted conclusions following its
review of nine Sign Ordinance provisions affecting downtown-area signage, but referred provisions dealing with sandwich-board signs and electronic signs back to the Committee for further review;

(2) Accepted the Design Committee's Design Guidelines document following a correction to its territory map;

(3) Viewed a PowerPoint presentation by the Downtown Director that reviewed 2009 accomplishments of the Downtown Management Board and its Committees; and

(3) Referred to its Parking Committee consideration of pursuing common joint-dumpster sites for downtown-area businesses.