|
Reprinted from The Orlando Sentinel, January 28, 1998.
Come On, Orlando, End 3 a.m. Closings
By Greg Dawson
The city of Orlando is paying almost $50,000 to a consultant to
help it decide what it wants to be when it grows up. Meanwhile, it still has a bedtime of
3 a.m.
Rob Highfill, general manager of The Club at Firestone, appeared before the City
Council Monday to ask permission to stay up past its bedtime—the 3 a.m. closing time
for Orlando nightspots.
Highfill was so courteous and deferential—he reminded me of a 10-year-old begging
his parents to let him stay up late because they had company staying overnight.
Pleeeze! Pleeeze! It’s just for one night. We promise we’ll be good! We
really, really will! Pleeeeze!
Highfill didn’t say it that way of course. He didn’t beg—not in so many
words. The epitome of professionalism, he made a reasoned case for allowing the Firestone
to stay open until 5 a.m. during the Gay Days at Walt Disney World weekend in June.
It’s getting harder and harder for downtown clubs to compete with the mushrooming
state-of-the-art entertainment zones at Disney and Universal, Highfill said, and the 3
a.m. closing time doesn’t help. Theme-park clubs and bars can stay open all night.
"We’re just asking for a competitive edge that one weekend," Highfill
told commissioners.
Pleeeze!
He got the same answer as the 10-year-old who asked to stay up late for company: En-oh.
Why? Because the ordinance says so, that’s why, said the city attorney.
"I guess it’s futile, huh?" Highfill said to the elders on the council.
He returned to his seat, crestfallen, like a kid in railroad train jammies going upstairs
to bed.
As the adults droned on inside the council chambers, I spoke with Highfill in the
lobby. Did he really expect the commission to suspend the bedtime for a weekend?
"I thought some of our supporters on the commission would bring it up," he
said. "We’re going to petition the mayor again. There are 100,000 people coming
to town, and we should grab as much of that business as we can."
More than 100 downtown businesses signed a petition opposing the 3 a.m. closing when it
was adopted last fall. Firestone has seen a 40 percent decline in business. Highfill is
worried the decline will become a collapse.
"We need to do something to bring people back downtown," he said. "If we
don’t act now we stand to lose it all."
The city mothers and fathers seem to realize that, too. The Downtown Development Board
is paying an outfit called Earthbase Idea Group nearly $50,000 to "re-brand"
downtown.
The Earthbase president said that means helping the city create what it wants to be and
then developing a strategy to get there. This could include a new name for downtown,
slogans and more advertising.
Somehow I don’t think the name is the problem. Besides, the names of the e-zones
that are stealing tourists from downtown aren’t that dazzlingly seductive. Downtown
Disney? My pulse is not racing.
Anyway, if Downtown Disney is O.K. for a phony downtown, why isn’t Downtown
Orlando O.K. for a real one? Is the idea to make Downtown Orlando sound like something
it’s not? I don’t get it.
But since Earthbase is going ahead with the makeover and is taking suggestions, I have
a few.
Possible new brand names for downtown Orlando: Miami Nice; New York South; Paris
Lite;
Healthy Choice Florida; I Can’t Believe It’s Not Atlanta; Mainstreet Orlando and
Orlando Classic (it didn’t work for Coke, but it’s worth a try).
I must warn you—I’m not as good at slogans as I am at names. But here goes:
- "Downtown Orlando: Try It, You’ll Like it!"
- "Downtown Orlando: You Gotta Problem With That?"
- "Downtown Orlando: So Much Excitement, So Little Parking!"
- "Downtown Orlando: It’s Not Just For Lost Iowans Anymore!"
Or perhaps we should keep it simple and address the problem Rob Highfill brought before
the council:
- "Downtown Orlando: Open All Night!"
Greg Dawson welcomes your comments. Telephone: (407) 420-5499. By E-mail: osodawson@aol.com.
Please include your name and phone number in messages.
The following was published as a letter to the editor in The Orlando
Sentinel on February 4, 1998:
At whose expense?
GREG DAWSON’S Jan. 28 column discussed the Orlando City Council’s refusal to
extend the required closing time for a downtown club during Disney’s Gay Days events
in June.
Rob Highfill, general manager of The Club at Firestone, complained because he is losing
money and business to Disney-owned clubs. Some time ago, The Club at Firestone’s
hours of operation were limited by the City Council in an effort to end raves. I guess
Highfill doesn’t get it: The City Council is making sure Disney gets all of the
late-night entertainment business.
To suggest that late-night activities at The Club at Firestone are more harmful to this
community than similar late-night activities on Disney property is absurd. Everything that
happens on Disney property directly reflects on Orlando, and vice-versa.
Why must downtown roll up the sidewalks as soon as it gets dark? There is vast untapped
potential in downtown Orlando, which is not visible, because of over regulation.
If you support taking revenue away from small businesses and giving it to the
entertainment giants, the council has done right by you. But if you own, work for or
support small businesses and are tired of Central Florida politicians supporting Disney
instead of the rest of our community, the Orlando City Council does not have your
interests in mind.
Regardless of your opinions, be heard.
Julie Abbott, MONTVERDE
|
