A leading Aberdeenshire town’s business community convened last night to discuss the prospect of becoming a Business Improvement District.
Inverurie is the latest place in Scotland to sign up to develop a BID programme, with the aim of bringing local businesses and organisations together to revitalise the town centre.
This follows on from the success of the Aberdeen Inspired BID.
It has been proposed that all eligible businesses and organisations in the Inverurie area contribute a financial levy to the scheme, including schools, halls, churches and charities or third sector organisations.
The monies raised would go to a central fund and be spent on projects and initiatives that have been developed and approved by the levy payers, through consultation on a detailed business plan.
Presentations were delivered at the Town Hall to try and persuade undecided businesses to join the initiative, including one by William Lippe of Lippe Architects, another from Explore Largs BID manager, John Hamilton and a third from retail initiatives expert, Gordon Bell.
The meeting completed the final stage of the consultation process for the town and paves the way for the ballot vote in June.
Ashley Wilson, the manager of her community’s BID, entitled We Are Inverurie, explained the development plan was still to be decided, but insisted it was a positive step forward.
She said: “This is an opportunity to see examples of how other BIDs work and I am hoping it sways the undecided in Inverurie.”
The presentation from the Explore Largs manager, John Hamilton, highlighted the potential benefits of becoming a BID town.
Largs has hosted a number of niche events annually since it became a BID and Mr Hamilton said: “It is not a panacea to fix what is wrong with the town, but we can do what we can do.
“We have brought in an extra £1.4million in Largs purely down to being a BID town.”
If the business sector votes to join the scheme in June’s ballot, Inverurie would be joining the swathe of other towns currently developing their own BIDs across Scotland, including Nairn and Peterhead.
There are now more than 30 such towns and cities in Scotland, including Aberdeen, Edinburgh Central, Elgin, Falkirk, Inverness, Largs, Linlithgow and Paisley.
Aberdeen Inspired has just been ratified for a second five-year term as has Elgin.
Bathgate in West Lothian was the first town in Scotland to launch a BID in 2008.
