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I think the whole thing is shamefully unprofessional (on both sides).  Is this how these folks do business?  It reads like post middle school break-up spat......

Totally agree..absolutely unprofessional. And immature. Completely. But effective and here's why:

We tried to reach Public Service, they denied a problem existed (despite dozens of claims to the contrary). We tried to reach the Director of Public Service, no dice either.

I wrote an email to all the Council Members and the Mayor regarding our issues. Not one person returned my email.

We wrote the Dispatch and they wrote a story chronicling our concerns (about two weeks ago). In the Dispatch story the Mayor said he'd like Public Service to use "common sense" to handle our concerns.

Yesterday, as I watched my friend Chad who owns J. Gumbo's being needlessly harassed (again), I tweeted about it. 

Sadly, it was the tweets that got a meeting scheduled for Monday. Our calls to Public Service were ignored. My letters to all the Council Members and the Mayor were ignored. The story in the Dispatch yielded no results but a string of tweets yielded us  a meeting with the Director. 

While I'm not a fan of using Twitter to solve problems, this is the only vehicle that worked for the small businesses. 

Do you have suggestions on how we could better approach it next time? We really are at a loss. When the Director, the Department, City Council and the Mayor won't return messages, where does that lead us?  I'd love another, better approach.

I don't see it that way. I see it as a frustrated business owner airing her side of a story that the politicians seem to want to ignore. From reading her tweets and her comments on Columbus Underground, it seems that local businesses have had major issues with this one department for a long time. Sometimes, you just have to take your fight out in the street.

Link to CU forum: http://www.columbusunderground...

Glad you cataloged this Alvin!  Tyler has a valid point, but I like yours better...by engaging both Coleman and DPS acknowledge there's an issue.  By dancing around the issue, they acknowledge a true lack of accountability.

Thanks Eric. You know what I'm talking about. :)

There was no doubt that their actions needed to be called out. But the manner, duration (nearly 4 hours) seems kinda silly for a business owner and city government. It definitely changed the way I think about both of those parties.  

Still...someone on the government side needs to be a little bit more proactive instead of dancing around. Agreed :)

Totally silly four hours. But sadly, completely effective. Been trying to get that meeting for four months. ; )

I watched this happen live yesterday. ...And I should say that I'm 100% on the side of Liz and all other small businesses in Columbus - especially downtown.

But...I've VERY disturbed by the amount of negative comments and the attacks on the government and administrations in Columbus. In case you've missed it, Columbus has been making nearly EVERY list as a top place for many different things over the past 2 years, including: Entrepreneurship, Tourism, Dining, etc. 

Does administrative redtape and politics get in the way sometimes, heck yes! 

But what everyone forgot in this situation is that Twitter is a public forum which means anyone could have followed this conversation. Yesterday was a terrible day for the branding of Columbus outside the city. In a week when National Geographic named Columbus a top Fall destination worldwide you could certainly bet that there were a lot of eyes and ears on Columbus and we completely dropped the ball on our responsibility of displaying Columbus as a great place to live, work and play. 

Just because social media is a great tool for open communication, that doesn't mean it's always the best option.

As a damn proud citizen of Columbus, I'm extremely sad about this. 

Maybe if the govt in this town wasn't a sack of congenital assholes?

I promise, outside my tiny circle of downtown, no one is reading my tweets. ; )

Thanks, Tyler.

The problems that small biz is having w/ our regulatory agencies is confined specifically to one department, the Department of Public Service. Small business shares wonderful, proactive and collaborative relations w/ all other departments (we are overseen by about a dozen of them). 

Small business mostly agrees that Columbus Public Health, Columbus Fire, Columbus Police, Building Services and the other departments do a phenomenal job and we have excellent relations with all of them. We even serve on many of their committees and have personal friendships with the other departments. There's a reason you see cops in Dirty Frank's every single night. ; )

Earlier this week I met personally with Building Services Director Davies to help reopen Hooligans. Yesterday our health inspector had lunch at my restaurant and we had a great talk about how the Health Department and local restaurants can better work together. Great collaborative relationships do exist between  small business and the City's departments, just not this one!

I can assure you this issue is isolated to one dysfunctional department and in no way reflects the other City agencies. 

That's great to hear! There's no doubt everything you're doing in Columbus is great for the city and it's encouraging to hear that the other relationships and departments are operating well.

I wish Columbus had 5 Liz Lesssner that add as much value to this city as your restaurants - that's why I'm so passionate about making sure we are always showing Columbus in the best possible light. 

But based on some of your other comments on this thread, it seems that your message to the city was delivered! Hopefully the results follow..best of luck moving forward! :)

Although I agree that people should be mindful of the things they say on Twitter and that it's not necessarily the most helpful thing to try to get results through calling someone out in public (although I'm not close to this situation so I can't comment on this particular incident), I don't think Columbus's public image will take too much of a beating due to this incident. Outsiders will probably not really understand the history of what's going on; what they'll see are citizens who are passionate about local business and not letting the government step all over them. And they may even be proud of individuals daring to stand up for themselves against bureaucratic BS.  We're not just looking at white gloved polite society seeing this exchange, but real people with their own real frustrations with government and their own struggles with work and their businesses.

Plus.... people who aren't involved will probably forget this quickly. It's important to us in Columbus, but it's not that juicy to keep outsiders hooked into it.

Thanks for your point of view Tyler. I really don't think the Columbus brand will take too much of a hit because of this conversation. While Twitter is a popular service, I don't think it's mainstream enough, nor does Liz have a huge celebrity like following outside of Columbus to make an impact. I will still support her businesses and other local business. Because of this conversation, I'm more likely to do so more.

I really think Mayor Coleman and DPS missed an opportunity for real conversation here. Instead, they just seemed to shrug it off.

I 10,000% disagree with you that the Columbus brand didn't take a beating yesterday. In the 4 RT's of this article alone, it has been broadcasted to over 8400 people. In 4 seemingly innocent tweets, that hit a lot of people. Then it gets picked up by the dispatch, then the news, etc. 

That is what social media is all about! Read the Thank You Economy and tell me that one "everyday" person doesn't have influence. Social media's power isn't in 'celebrity'

I will also support her businesses because I believe in Columbus and the people like Liz that are putting it on themselves to make it a great place. 

But you are right: Mayor Coleman and DPS missed a HUGE opportunity to have a real conversation. The Google Circle idea is genius. We also don't know what is going on behind the scenes. I doubt Mayor Coleman shrugged this off completely

Ok, I certainly agree with your point about social media's reach. I've lived it with some of the events I've organized. I guess my point is that Columbus' response is all politics. I think people view politicians negatively anyway but really don't hold that against the citizens and businesses of the city. I've railed on endlessly in the past about how pathetic I think our local politicians are. But that doesn't stop me from celebrating the people and businesses in Columbus. Yeah, you all suck during football season, but I can look past that.

Local government needs work! No doubt. But I think Mayor Coleman is one of the top Mayors in the entire country - he's leading one of the strongest regional economies in the nation...I think there is just a disconnect between some of the agencies - and even Liz shows that it is just DPS, none of the other ones.  

Sounds like MC needs to go in a make some changes at 109 North Front St...

...and no better cares about Michigan :-P