Sacramento, CA (Feb. 21, 2023) - Here is Mayor Darrell Steinberg’s State of Downtown speech given on Tuesday Feb. 21, 2023 at the Safe Credit Union Convention Center.

“Thank you, Jay for that kind introduction. Before I start, I’d like to say we’ll be joining Kaiser in lighting our downtown city buildings purple for home games. Go Kings. Light the beam.

Just think, when we were all together in this room last year, there was no beam and the Kings were on their way to 13th place in the Western Conference. What a difference a year makes.

The beam is a brilliant marketing strategy but so much more. In Sacramento, what’s real sells. This beam has become a point of pride and unity for our community.

The beam is like the Kings themselves. The beam is Sacramento. We’re not jaded. We’re earnest and hopeful about our future, even when faced with a 16-year playoff drought. We understand our challenges, and we never stop fighting for better. And we love being together. We love what it takes to overcome adversity. We really, REALLY, love to light the beam.

I think the improbable rise of the Kings and our celebrity laser beam are pretty good metaphors for what I see as the state of our downtown in 2023. The Kings rise and the shining of the beam is not a matter of dumb luck. And the truth is that the Kings rise was not a miracle brought on by a purple light, it was the result of careful planning, preparation, leadership, talent, and heart. Just like the downtown partnership and the people who have seen our downtown through its great rise, its most difficult times, and now get to be part of its inspiring comeback.

I know there are some who see the downtown as broken and hopeless. I reject all the handwringing.

Imagine if we lit the beam for every success we’ve had in this downtown over the last 6 years, especially the last three when the light went out and everything changed forever.

I’m not delusional. Our downtown faces big challenges right now. I’m fully committed to creating a clean and secure environment where everyone feels safe to enjoy themselves. Safety issues and the social condition are real and must continue to be addressed. But they aren’t very different from the challenges faced by virtually every downtown in America. I’m not speaking today about the problems. We work on them every day and…..with the city and county together like never before, I am confident there will be even greater progress.

Please don’t despair. Fight alongside us for the breakthroughs that are so close. Fight against the despair. Fight for the light.

Light the beam for all those working day and night to bring back the momentum we had downtown prior to Covid. There are so many rays of light. I see a downtown that is Class A office space and so much more. Downtown’s future is also a home for thousands, great food and unending entertainment.

Light a beam for our growing identity as a city of festivals. Almost 44,000 people stayed overnight in Sacramento last year to attend Aftershock. Our new country music festival, Golden Sky, drew more people than anticipated in its first year at Discovery Park. I want to thank Danny Wimmer for having such faith in our city. He’s going to bring back Golden Sky next year with an even better lineup. The $1.5 million in stimulus money the city put into Golden Sky is a great example of how a relatively modest investment can pay big dividends for our economy.

Or the Sol Blume R&B festival, which started small in Cesar Chavez Park in 2018 and last year drew 28,000 people to Discovery Park. Sol Blume is run by a group of people who grew up here in Sacramento – (CHAZ) Boswell, Fornati Kumen and Manny Hunter. CHAZ says he hopes the success of Sol Blume shows people what is possible in this market and will inspire others to take creative chances.

We have a lot of young creative people here like Chaez. Or Tony Christ and Ryan Royster from Tiger and now Solomon’s on K Street. People who have ideas for how to activate public spaces in a new way. They are taking the baton of leadership for a new generation, as are the young people – a majority of women – who are now sitting on the dais at City Council --- Mai Vang, Caity Maple, Katie Valenzuela Lisa Kaplan, Karina Talamantes. You are going to determine the future of downtown and Sacramento. Light a beam for the new generations of young people choosing downtown Sacramento as the place to live, work and play.

Light a beam for the Midtown Association’s gutsy move to bring back Second Saturdays beginning this May. You can hear the skeptics tick off reasons not to do it. There are a thousand reasons TO do it. Sacramento wants more art, more food, more music and more fun. Can’t wait till May.

Light a beam for Visit Sac and our hoteliers. Our hotel occupancy is at 99 percent of pre-pandemic levels. Light a beam for the 684 new hotel rooms we’ve added in the past couple of years, including 179 rooms under construction right now in the AC Marriott. I say we make it a goal to add 800 more rooms in the next five years. That will mean bigger conventions and shows in our new Safe Credit Union complex. More money spent in our restaurants and our other downtown businesses.

Light a beam for the 1,809 new housing units in the central city over the past four years, and the 3,000 units that are under construction. Thirty years ago we couldn’t persuade a developer to build residential in downtown without a huge subsidy. Now investors recognize the great potential in our downtown. The northeast corner of 10th and J, which has sat vacant and blighted for 15 years, was just sold to a housing developer that’s planning to build 250 units. Light a beam on J Street.

*Photo Credit - Verbal Adam - Sacramento Observer*

One big opportunity to bring more housing to downtown was opened up just a few weeks ago when the state announced that it would make three state office buildings along the Capitol Mall available for conversion to housing. They have issued a request for qualifications and I would encourage you all to take a look. The RFQ allows for adaptive reuse or demolition of the buildings. It can be done all as one project or be split. This could be a mixed-use urban village with as many as 1,000 market rate and affordable housing units. We will continue to push for more state and local workers coming back to their offices. But let’s light a beam for acting to reimagine a downtown where people live, eat, and play. Light a beam on Capitol Mall.

How about a beam for our great businesses and restaurateurs who have hung on and made it work or even opened in the past few years. People like Ernesto Delgado of La Cosecha, who has spearheaded an effort to enliven Cesar Chavez Park with more lighting, planters, more maintenance and more programming.

I know cleanliness and safety are top of mind for Ernesto and everyone downtown right now. I don’t know about you but I can already see an improvement in the blocks around city hall because of the new cleanup workers funded with our city’s American Rescue Plan dollars. I will work to make this level of support permanent in the city budget and find other ways to partner in providing this important foundation for our growth.

How about lighting a beam for the fact that in November voters approved Measure N by more than 70 percent. Measure N gives us much more flexibility with how we can use those hotel tax dollars generated by visitors. Its passage means we can revive our plan to create new amenities and attractions on the Old Sacramento waterfront.

This doesn’t have to wait. We have between $63 million and $75 million of hotel tax bonding capacity without raising a dime of new taxes. Along with a must have national, state and regional youth sports facility in South Sac…no more Sac parents taking their children to compete in other cities supporting their economies…We are ready again with bold plans for a nearly $30-million dollar waterfront makeover that will open up the public market buildings with glass sides, create a two-story platform and walking bridge to the embarcadero and install a new children’s play area in waterfront park. Thanks to Assemblymember Kevin McCarty, the state is also poised for action with a fully funded plan to revamp its Old Sacramento park with a viewing and events platform and pedestrian friendly landscaping that will – for the first time – actually allow people to get down to the water. The state also plans to partner with a private developer to fill the grassy vacant space in front of the Railroad Museum with a new hotel with 250 rooms.

Today is a key moment downtown. Old Sac and the waterfront will proudly light beams for decades to come.

All of the above and more adds up to a downtown dynamism that can’t be turned back. We are a proud state Capital and we are so much more.

I love the state and Governor Newsom and his administration continue to be great friends and allies, but we have known even prior to Covid that we must not rely on the state for our economic future. That realization is a challenge but also a gift. Let’s face it, the state does a lot of things well, but it’s not exactly known for creating 24-7 neighborhoods pulsing with energy and creativity. We need to find another way, and the pandemic has accelerated that discussion.

The downtown of our future will be a neighborhood with a healthy mix of housing and jobs. Imagine an iconic grocery store on the corner of 16th and J. It’s happening! Let’s build on our base of restaurants, nightlife, and attractions like Golden 1, Old Sacramento and the Crocker to brand downtown not just as the central business district, but also as the social and entertainment district of the entire Sacramento region.

In the coming weeks, my office will be working with the Downtown Partnership, Visit Sac and anyone else to partner and create a dynamic advertising campaign to promote downtown. We won’t beg state workers to come back. We’ll use billboards, social media, TV—to say, “Look at what you’re missing out on when you work from home with your suitcoat on top and your pajamas on the bottom.”

We are already on our way. A group of researchers from the University of Toronto are using cell phone data to track the recovery of downtowns. Guess what, mid-sized cities are outperforming bigger cities. Sacramento’s downtown activity is at 75 percent of pre-pandemic levels. That’s better than LA, Portland, Seattle, Vancouver, San Jose, San Francisco and most other cities.

Let’s get it to 100. To 150. Light the beam on downtown. We can and will do it together. Thank you.”