Businesses are leaving downtown Louisville. Lawmakers and the governor better take it seriously.

Mayor Greenburg’s rosy State of the City speech notwithstanding, Louisville is in big trouble and as Louisville goes, so goes Kentucky.

The mayor, the governor and the state legislature all seemed to be caught flat footed when three major businesses – Humana, LG&E, and Fifth Third Bank – announced they were leaving the heart of downtown.  Although they aren’t leaving Louisville, these moves will devastate businesses downtown that depend on lunchtime foot traffic.

Mayor Greenburg’s office said they view this as “an opportunity for future growth.”  Uh huh.  Just like the Hindenburg created a great “opportunity” for Lakehurst, New Jersey.

Why isn't the Legislature concerned about downtown Louisville?

Have you heard a peep from the Legislature about this?  Of course not.  They’re too busy trying to solve JCPS’s problems with their zero expertise in educational management administration.  They’re swamped trying to pass legislation to take fluoride out of our water supply while ignoring the adamant concerns of dental professionals – you know, the people who actually know all about teeth.

I would suggest the State Legislature has nothing more important to do than help Louisville right now.  Immediately.  Many outstate legislators genuinely don’t like Louisville and have long believed “Louisville’s problems are not our problems.” They forget that, according to studies by former U of L Economist Paul Coomes, 50% of the tax money collected in Jefferson County goes directly to the state to support small, rural communities that can’t support themselves without the big city’s help.  Legislators needs to jump in with both feet to help us if they want to preserve cash for their communities.

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Use tax incentives to attract major corporations to Louisville

The Legislature needs to be working with the governor and mayor to create extremely attractive tax incentives to attract major corporations to Louisville. These incentives need to be unprecedented, too good to refuse. Remember, the taxes we give up through corporate incentives will create thousands of taxpaying jobs which will support scores of other businesses.

This needs to happen fast so that Gov. Beshear and Mayor Greenburg can then hit the road  to meet with CEO’s of fortune 500 companies to lure a couple of them to Louisville’s downtown.

I’d start with UPS and try to get their world headquarters located in the same city as UPS Worldport.  I’d sell the fact that Louisville is a much more affordable city with a better quality of life than Atlanta.  If UPS says no, I’d keep knocking on doors until I did get interest.  I’d pitch less traffic and less crime.

We need to be able to assure them we are making downtown a safe zone from Broadway to River Road and First to Ninth Street. That means businesspeople, street vendors, tourists, Fourth Street Live bar patrons and evening restaurant goers can move in and out of this downtown area knowing that we have taken aggressive steps to secure their safety. We can say, “We’ve proactively and boldly created a zone where you will feel safe if you work, visit or locate your business downtown. It’s a place where citizens will feel safer and criminals will not consider this a productive environment.” We can do that by increasing our police presence in this zone, adding community ambassadors and helping all homeless people rehouse or relocate outside of the zone.

You don’t have to be an urban planner or an economist to see that if we don’t get these buildings reoccupied, the once vibrant downtown of Louisville will collapse. When that happens, it will be catastrophic for more than Louisville. Every little town and county in Kentucky will suddenly find that their once reliable ATM machine called Louisville is no longer able to support their schools and roads.

The Kentucky Legislature and the governor had better take this seriously - and fast.

Bill Lamb worked in television for most of his career before retiring in 2022. Most recently he was the Senior Vice President and General Manager of KTTV and KCOP, two Fox owned television stations in Los Angeles. Before that he was the President and General Manager of WDRB and WBKI in Louisville and the Vice-President of Broadcast Operations for Block Communications, Inc. overseeing nine television stations. In 2018, Bill was inducted into the Kentucky Broadcasting Hall of Fame. Lamb will write commentary regularly for The Courier Journal.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Legislators must look at downtown Louisville vacancies as a warning