Newry BID Hold AGM after successful second year
Newry Business Improvement District (BID) held their second AGM in Canal Court Hotel to close a successful second year in operation.
Newry BID was voted in by city centre businesses in November 2015 and became operational in 2016.
Since then the BID has been tackling issues affecting business and delivering projects and improvements to raise Newry’s profile and trading environment.
Newry BID manager Eamonn Connolly spoke to members about some of the major wins Newry BID has had in the BIDs second year of its five-year term, including offering free training to over 100 businesses in the BID area, providing over 400 free car parking spaces, creating engaging marketing campaigns during key trading times to promote Newry as a destination on both sides of the border, and successfully lobbying to secure the future of Public Space CCTV within the City Centre.
Mr Connolly also discussed some major projects that have already started in Year 3 of Newry BID, including the recent Engage events that were held in conjunction with University of Ulster.
These events were designed to enable Newry BID members to have their input on creating a vision for Newry City Centre and in prioritising what Newry BID can do to help create this vision. The highly successful events had over 100 members attending, which saw real time results from the discussions taking place.
The results from these discussions showed that key areas businesses would like tackled included parking, vacant properties / cleanliness within the City Centre and business rates.
Speaking about the event Mr Connolly said, “We were delighted to see a strong turn out from our members which highlights the importance businesses attach to the key issues they face. Newry BID will now look at the results from the events and use them to prioritise our strategic plan for the rest of our term,” he added.
To close out the AGM Mr Connolly encouraged members to engage with the BID to help achieve better outcomes for Newry.
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