5 ways Wilmington's Municipal Services District is making an impact downtown
Wilmington Downtown Inc.’s Municipal Services District completed its first year of a new five-year contract with the city of Wilmington and has made several improvements to the downtown area.
The Municipal Services District’s budget for the 2023 fiscal year of $562,692 covered areas such as Wilmington Downtown Inc. overhead, marketing, facade grants, cleaning, street outreach and safety.
“Our MSD contract with the city underscores our unwavering commitment to excellence in district management,” said Wilmington Downtown Inc. Vice President Christina Haley.
The Municipal Services District provides an overlay of special services throughout a 70-block area of downtown. These services include beautification and landscaping, safety and hospitality, street outreach and encampment cleaning.
Wilmington Downtown Inc. contracts with Block by Block, a nationally recognized leader in hospitality, safety, and facility maintenance for operations within the Central Business District.
Here’s a look at how the MSD's services have made an impact on the downtown area within the past fiscal year.
Municipal Ambassadors Program
Haley said the bulk of the MSD’s contract with the city revolves around the district’s operations through its ambassadors program.
Three full-time ambassadors, an operations manager and team lead help ensure the district remains clean, safe and welcoming, Haley said.
The team focuses on areas such as graffiti removal, pressure washing, litter and biohazard removal, safety escorts, hospitality assistance, business contacts, street light outage reporting and street outreach.
Beautification and landscaping
Wilmington Downtown Inc. awarded eight Facade Improvement Grants in the 2023 fiscal year ranging from $900 to $5,000 to help improve the beautification of the downtown area.
The Municipal Services District also completed a large $20,000 landscaping initiative to improve planting beds and tree wells along prominent streets in the downtown area.
The project covered 33 beds and 37 tree wells on Third Street between Market and Davis streets, seven beds including portions of the median on Market Street between Water and Third streets and eight beds on North Front Street between Market and Princess streets.
About 300 Asiatic Jasmine plants were also planted in beds along Third, Market and North Front streets.
The team also pressure washed 100,965 feet surrounding the Wilmington Convention Center, Hannah Block Historic USO/Community Arts Center, the North Fourth Street Bridge and Post Office Alley. The team also increased its graffiti removal by 48%.
Safety and hospitality
The ambassadors work to keep the downtown area safe and welcoming, according to Haley.
Over the past year, the ambassadors have increased street light outage reports to 55%, increased motorist assists 39% and given over 700 hospitality escorts.
The team also increased its biohazard removal by 15% and removed 482 bags of trash from the downtown area.
Street outreach
The outreach efforts of the district in the past fiscal year resulted in 33 people entering rehab, 44 people in shelters and 71 people housed.
Crisis intervention, transportation assistance and food stamps were also areas that the district increased efforts in.
Encampment cleaning
Through coordination with the North Carolina Department of Transportation, the district removed 19,000 pounds of trash from unhoused encampments. The district's employees also removed an additional 110 bags of trash from encampment areas.
The team also removed 54 hypodermic needles from unhoused encampments.
This article originally appeared on Wilmington StarNews: Wilmington's Municipal Services District highlights improvements downtown
