City-sponsored 'Fashion Row' meeting tonight at 6 p.m. at Dekka in Hallandale Beach

The City of Hallandale Beach is hosting a 'Fashion Row' meeting tonight at 6 p.m. at Dekka, 139 N.E. 1st Avenue, Hallandale Beach.
It's long overdue!

To me and many other concerned residents of this southeast Broward County city, it sounds exactly like something that... well, in another city, would've already been taking place at least once a year since the Fashion Row idea started, whenever that was while I was working up in Washington, D.C.

My reason for mentioning this now, at this rather late date, is that I just recently found out about it on Tuesday night, and I want as many articulate and impassioned people as possible to make plans to show-up and demand some accountability, since the red-tape overkill and lack of clarity by Code Compliance at Hallandale Beach City Hall is literally killing businesses and jobs here.

It's something that lots of people in town are talking about more and more openly and frequently in restaurants and other meeting places, and many believe that City Hall has been guilty of being too blase about this simmering dis-satisfaction.
Well, now it's all in the open.

I don't currently own a business here in town but in talking to friends and trusted activists in HB who do, it's clear that there are far too many nonsensical sections of the code compliance manual in this city that rather than serve some self-evident public safety or building safety aspect that everyone would support, actually serve to frustrate small business owners who want to improve their property and become more competitive.
And stand out!

Their ability to survive is in question, and un-necessary permit costs and fines are the very thing that will cause them to either move or close-up shop, and there are too few big-picture minded business owners in HB as it is, we can't lose the ones we have.

Just to give you some sense of the dis-connect, as I've mentioned in this space previously, as of today, there are a couple of dozen Fashion Row directional signs still standing, but STILL ZERO of the HB Chamber of Commerce, which you can't find unless you go to City Hall, park your car in the parking lot and walk past their entrance opposite the breezeway from City Hall.
Another genius marketing move -NOT!

Echoing comments I've made here and at City Commission meetings, there's nothing about the location of the CoC anywhere in the city, not even right out front on U.S-1 despite the tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars that have flowed their way, averaging about $50,000 a year, with very little to show for it in the way of tangible results.

I wonder if their Patricia Genneti will have the nerve to show her smug face at the meeting and, ironically, face the music?
I suspect she will be a no-show, even though she is exactly the sort of character who needs to be held to account.

I can hardly wait 'til I hear the questions about the rampant and rapidly-expanding graffiti problem and the city's invisible effort to combat it, not only near the businesses along the F.E.C. railroad tracks and Hallandale Beach Blvd., but all down U.S.-1/Federal Highway, where it is on nearly single every light and traffic pole and bus shelter on U.S.-1 all the way down to Aventura Hospital, just as it was early last year on the east side before The Village at Gulfstream Park opened.

"HGS" positively owns U.S.-1!

I've been taking photos of the problem for years and the fact that the Nick's restaurant parking lot sign on 1st Avenue is completely covered with 'tags' is embarrassing in the extreme.

I'll post some of them here in the next few days when I can lay them out in a way that gives more context to you readers so it'll be clear why this news is so very troublesome.

It often seems that these sorts of Quality-of-Life issues are ignored and forgotten almost as soon as HB City Hall hears about them, as that's been my experince over the past seven years, even when I've connected-the-dots to City Hall officials in excruciating detail.
At City Hall!

Tonight's meeting should be pretty fiery and I plan on being there.


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