Tuesday March 26th, 2024 we had our annual State of Downtown breakfast where we updated our partners and stakeholders on our past year and our plans for the year ahead!
Our Board Chair, Kipp Blewett kicked things off by thanking our team for throwing such a beautiful event, and set the tone for the day.
Kathy Lester, Sacramento Police Department Chief, awarded Ernesto Delgado the JVance Stewart Community Service Award. She had such kind words to say about Ernesto and we couldn’t agree more. His tenacity and business savvy are shaping the new downtown.
Executive Director of the Downtown Sacramento Partnership, Michael Ault gave an info-packed speech with data from Dr. Sanjay Varshney who calculated a $4.3 Billion dollar loss in tax revenue over 20 years if we continue to fight the uphill battle against work-from-home.
That’s $4.3 billion we could put toward a new event venue, museum, waterfront restoration or literally ANYTHING else. 20 years seems pretty far away, but as we know, days are long, but years are short. We have to and we are shifting our focus to motivating people to come downtown, rather than mandating them.
Which is why we’re working with Sacramento famous event and activation hosts, HOF, to bring a downtown roller rink to Ali Youseffi Square.
We do not and will not see downtown’s decline. We actively encourage growing our skyline with more housing.
Check out our Policy Manager, Liz Lorand Williams’ interview with Solving Sacramento to learn more about what we’re doing and how we’re advocating for housing in our downtown core.
We debuted our complied _____ Downtown video where after watching, the room filled with inspiration and applause. This video series features people who are defining what it means to be uniquely Sacramento and asks them how downtown has impacted their stories. The next installment will feature Ryan Royster, co-founder of Last Supper Society.
The keynote speaker, David Dixon, Stantec Urban Places Fellow gave great insight on the value of downtown and how the data shows that more people than ever want to live in walkable cities.
Lastly, Mayor Steinberg closed us out with his hopes and goals for his last 10 months in-office.
We had Concerts in the Park alumni and current Torch Club residents, LabRats playing people on and off stage with their funky arrangements and goofy energy. They really made this year special and different!
Internally this is our most-anticipated event of the year. Our whole staff puts the hours in to make it beautiful and functional. Our Clean and Safe team shines up in their black polos to usher in all of our guests after beautifying our entire district. The Policy team makes sure we have our elected officials in attendance and fact-checks our speech. Economic Development team brings our business owners and Calling All Dreamers. Marketing and communications ensure all on-screen visuals, print materials and media spots are up to par. Administration handles everything and helps everyone from managing dietary restrictions, to our seating chart, to printing name badges on-site. And without our Events staff we’d have no order; they instruct, construct, and coordinate this event months in advance. The Downtown Sacramento Partnership team should be incredibly proud of each other and the result of our hard work.
