Business Promotion and Economic Development

By Ann Keighran

The City of Burlingame has many customers. As such, the City recognizes the need for positive level of customer service.

In conjunction with the building department, community meetings were held to obtain feedback on Building Division customer service improvements and recommendations were implemented.

I strongly encouraged the Council to consider hiring a part-time economic development specialist/business ambassador in order to improve our business climate and foster a more positive business attitude. This goal was accomplished in 2008 when we hired Patricia Love. The City of Burlingame now has an active Economic Subcommittee, which has improved Burlingame's outreach to new businesses for our City along with retaining and expanding our existing businesses. We have met with the car dealerships, hotel managers, realtors, biotech, owners and managers of retail and restaurant businesses around the city, in addition to developers of the Bayfront area. This subcommittee has worked collaboratively with business organizations to hear their ideas, concerns and plans for Burlingame's future. Listening to these concerns has also helped us improve landscaping, trolley service and signage issues businesses were experiencing.

We have established pre-application meetings. Peninsula Hospital and Burlingame Point are two of the organization that participated in these meetings. Burlingame Point was a 750,000 square foot office/life science proposal that was recently approved by the Planning Commission and City Council. It is a project that also provides improvements to our Bayfront trail, adds retail and restaurants, a gym and child care. We now have a state of the art hospital which is the envy of the Peninsula.

I have continued to work with the Chamber of Commerce in conducting concierge tours each year to increase the visibility of our businesses especially our mom and pop stores which have limited money to market themselves in our downtown areas. It is important to promote our hotels and solicit new shops and restaurants in order to increase and diversify the city's sources of tax revenue in order to support and increase our quality services for our residents in Burlingame.

I trust that the above activities support my being re-elected to your Burlingame City Council to continue to provide your City with this level of service.