Dean Debnam: More bars not the downtown answer

As a business owner, lifelong resident and advocate for Raleigh, I couldn’t stand by and do nothing while I saw what was happening in the city elections. Bar and nightclub owners have given tens of thousands of dollars to candidates and causes pushing for more bars and relaxed drinking rules, with more money on the way.

To put it simply, this goes directly against the resident-friendly, economically diverse vision for downtown that the City Council has been building for the past 20-plus years.

With 3,500 new apartments and housing units being added over the next two to three years, we need a larger vision for the center of our city than that of a place that touts its nightlife.

Raleigh has been trying to foster a smart, balanced downtown community that’s an attractive place for businesses and employers like me for decades.

Now is not the time to change course and strive to be a bigger version of what we already see on Fayetteville Street at 1 a.m on a weekend.

To attract more jobs, people and companies like Red Hat and Citrix, we’re going to have to do better than the promise of more places to grab a drink.

This story was originally published October 9, 2015 at 5:12 PM with the headline "Dean Debnam: More bars not the downtown answer."