Rent in downtown Cape

Referencing a front-page article of the Wednesday, March 26, edition of your paper concerning the empty spaces in downtown and how they have hurt the renewal efforts, I have thought long and hard on the cause of this myself.

Amazingly, I've arrived at two simple reasons based on my personal dealings with the downtown area. These are: A) the city government and B) rental cost of office space. Let me address "B" first.

I realize the folks that own these places and rent them out do so hoping, among other things, to make some money on their investment, and I don't blame them. However, the biggest expense to any small business is rent. Only when a business is established through advertising and customer traffic can this expense be less of a problem.

Places that rent at an asking price of $600 to $1,000 per month, maybe more, should consider rents of maybe $200 to $300 per month on a two- or three-year lease, letting the new place get a firm foothold and still getting some income off their building, creating traffic flow downtown and revenue for the city. Not the ideal fix maybe, but I'll bet there would be fewer empty store fronts.

And that other reason, the city government, well, I'll keep my thoughts on them to myself for now.

Sincerely,

RICH BEHRING, Cape Girardeau