BIDS WERE CREATED TO REDUCE FRICTION ON THE STREET. NEW YORK SHOULD LET THEM DO THEIR JOB.
BIDs emerged in New York in the late 1980s and early 1990s during a period of fiscal strain, rising vacancies, and declining foot traffic across many commercial corridors. The city needed a localized mechanism that could act faster than centralized agencies. Property owners agreed to self-assess within defined boundaries, and that money stayed inside the district to fund services the city could not reliably deliver on its own.
