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Business leaders say downtown vacancy worse than citywide figures; OED offers methodological caveats
Summary
Downtown business representatives told the council they calculate a 28.2% adjusted downtown vacancy and urged pop-ups, storefront improvements and security investments; OED said citywide vacancy is about 7.5% and offered to provide district-level analysis and quick-win pilots.
Business leaders told the Berkeley City Council on Feb. 25 that the downtown experience on the ground does not match citywide vacancy figures and urged immediate action to support storefronts.
"The downtown vacancy rate with adjust is actually 28.2%," John Kaner of the Downtown Berkeley Association told the council, saying the figure reflects removal of non-commercial floor area and the impacts of paused development projects; he described rent declines of 20% to 40% and urged initiatives such as storefront art, pop-ups and expedited permitting to revive downtown foot traffic.
Alex Knox, executive director of the Telegraph Business Improvement District, said some on-the-ground vacancy appears worse than the aggregated data suggests and emphasized place-based responses: "We are focusing our efforts around placemaking, brand development, activations, business support and traction," he told the council.
OED staff responded that methodology matters. Vincent Coy noted the dashboard's citywide commercial vacancy presented at about 7.5% and said that a single large floorplate or a reclassification of space (for example, removal of parking or institutional square footage from the commercial denominator) can change district percentages dramatically. Staff offered to provide parcel- and district-level maps that show the boundaries and the data behind the vacancy calculations.
Council members and staff agreed to pursue follow-up work with downtown partners, including short-term pilot ideas and targeted messaging. Staff suggested convening to discuss quick wins (storefront activations, expedited licensing support, and coordinated marketing) and longer-term pilots to better align commercial property types with small-business needs.
The council did not adopt immediate policy changes in the special session but asked staff to return with more detailed district data and options for rapid interventions.
