CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) — This week, WBBM has been airing an in-depth series on how Chicago’s downtown has evolved since the pandemic, and on Wednesday, the focus was how businesses along Michigan Avenue have dealt with the issue of crime as the area works to recover from 2020.
“It is something that we struggle with, because there’s the saying: ‘Good news travels fast; bad news travels faster,’” said Kimberly Bares, CEO of the Magnificent Mile Association (MMA).
The MMA oversees much of the economic activity on North Michigan Avenue, Streeterville, River North, River West and the Gold Coast — an area that accounts for about 8% of the city’s total GDP.
WBBM caught up with Bares along North Michigan Avenue, where she provided an overview of the area’s crime challenges since the pandemic, as well as an outline of ongoing solutions. From a business perspective, Bares said the struggle in 2023 hasn’t necessarily been with crime itself, but with a consumer perception of crime — one that she said was based on lingering imagery from 2020.
“The old stories that people have on some kind of repeat, that they continue to cycle through, even though the events in 2020 are now three years ago and, frankly, far back in our rear view mirror,” she said.
Bares does agree with other downtown stakeholders that isolated crime involving violence, property damage, or theft has historically been a reality of any major city. The effects were only heightened in 2020 when a mixture of non-existent foot traffic during the pandemic and a social justice reckoning after George Floyd’s murder created added opportunity for crime.
“What we said all the way through 2020, was that the real story and the real negative impact was the pandemic,” she said.
Bares doubled down on the idea that the impact of the pandemic on downtown businesses was larger than the impacts that could be traced back to crime, and she attempted to dispel any myth that businesses have been leaving because of crime.
“Not that I can think of,” she said. “If you were to ask me the pandemic question, I would point you to Roots pulling out of the entire U.S. market during the pandemic. I would point to other stores that closed during the pandemic — the mozzarella store that closed during the pandemic because they just couldn’t make a go of it.”
Although Bares acknowledged that the No. 1 concern for downtown businesses north of the river is organized retail crime, she added that arrests — due, in part, to shifts in state legislation, investigative practices, and cooperation from the online retailers where stolen goods are often sold — are “finally having an impact.”
“We saw that a couple of years ago, there was a crew that was responsible for several hundred thousands of dollars of theft here in the district,” Bares said. “It was led by a fellow, Tacarre Harper. He was arrested, his whole gang was arrested. They’ve all gone. They’ve been put away for 10 – 12 years, and when that crew was caught and stopped, we saw the number of those kinds of burglaries drop precipitously.”
Retail crime numbers, according to the National Retail Federation, have fallen from second-most in the nation in 2020 to being tied for seventh- and eighth-most in 2022. Bares credited part of that drop with their involvement in an organized retail crime task force with the Illinois Attorney General’s Office, the Chicago Police Department, the sheriff’s office and others.
Michigan Avenue in downtown has also been designated as a special service area for the past two years, which has allowed additional agencies, such as the Cook County Sheriff’s Office, to gain funding for added downtown patrols.
“Through our Special Service area, we commit about 60% of our funds to safety and security,” Bares said. “We pay for that ourselves. If anyone wants to know how we do it: We invest significant resources, our own resources, into safety and security.”
There’s also been the CPD strategic deployment initiative, on North Michigan Avenue, which has been visible since the summer of 2020.
“Police cars in the median, with the lights going, those are additional officers there,” Bares said.
She said additional patrols have also been added near the temporary casino site to ensure casino goers are “safe and secure” when they leave.
The MMA has also maintained close communication with existing businesses, in order to address individual crime concerns with adaptive measures.
“That includes everything from their own store policies, helping them hire great in-store security, making sure that they have working security cameras and surveillance cameras, helping them harden the target, so to speak,” Bares said. “One example of that is a film that goes on a glass plate, so that if anyone were to try and do a smash and grab, the glass plate wouldn’t shatter — it would crackle, but it wouldn’t break.”
Bares said they are also now looking at a pilot program with the Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT) to put safety bollards along the avenue to prevent vehicles from breaching the sidewalk.
The result, Bares insisted, is that the Magnificent Mile district has become both safe and welcoming to all. Another contributing factor: Partnerships with organizations to bring youth downtown for engaging positive experiences, including My Block My Hood My City, which reciprocated by inviting MMA partners to participate in lighting up King Drive for the holidays.
To those across the nation and in the suburbs, Bares said that overall, the people who live and do business downtown every day and night, report feeling relatively safe — and that crime downtown, just isn’t what it used to be.
“Sadly, it is one of those things where people have to be willing to come downtown and see it with their own two eyes,” she said. “For some folks, no amount of me or anyone else saying it will convince them. They just have to come down and see it with their own two eyes. That’s why I say we’d be happy to roll out the red carpet for any of those naysayers.”
When attracting new business, Bares said that companies do see the reality of a safer downtown. Ultimately, though, their decisions now boil down to financial feasibility, and she noted that the Mag Mile district is responsible for a $2 billion property tax liability each year.
South of the river, the Loop has experienced its own set of challenges with crime during the pandemic, but with many collaborative solutions already long-implemented, stakeholders there said the biggest issue remains that lingering and — as they described it — unrealistic public perception of crime in downtown Chicago.
Remember to tune in to WBBM on Thursday night at 7 p.m. for an hour-long, in-depth discussion about the future of downtown.
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