Conversation with Michael Bush

A residential building boom, homelessness problems, the departure of an iconic restaurant and the arrival of new businesses: Those are just some of the issues that Michael Bush, president of the Rosemary District Neighborhood Association, has on his radar.

The owner of Home Resource on Central Avenue, Bush also created the Sarasota Design District, an alliance of design-related businesses within the Rosemary District. We talked to Bush about the ongoing homelessness problem, the growing sense of community in the area and the future of a city that’s long sought to capitalize on its buzz.

It was just about a year ago that the Sarasota Design District was formed — how are things going?

I think the effect is both inward and outward. In terms of inward, what it's done is brought together a group of people who are like-minded. There's been a lot of structure put in place. We're in the process of building the dues-paying membership. There have been some events that have been done, and there are more in the planning phase. Within the last year, all of a sudden, everybody has grown to realize there's a strength in association. People might say, I didn't realize there was a guy who did concrete design, or a cabinet guy, or a flooring person. It's given some good visibility to entities that perhaps it wouldn't have on its own.

Externally, I think it's still in that building stage. When we started with the original press, there was a tremendous overflow of people loving the idea. What has really happened is — more focus has been put on infrastructure. You have to put an infrastructure in place before you can grow the organization, so there hasn't been the same level of awareness as there was initially.

Once the infrastructure is set, how do you go back to that external focus?

Then, to me, it's all about trying to highlight the amazing talent that's within the Design District. We did a 10 by 10 back in November — 10 representatives from different businesses that presented ideas. It was a chance to see what people think, a chance to think of projects. It gave people within the district a chance to explore and understand who fellow members are. All of a sudden, you go, "Wow." You start to realize there's such an amazing concentration of talent here. That was really exciting to see. It's going to be about rolling out, about creating awareness. Now that we've got a structure, let's make the city of Sarasota and the west coast of Florida aware of the design strength here.

Focus has been on residential growth, but retail and restaurants have anchored Rosemary for a while. Do you see that sector growing, too?

Each one of these residential projects — you can't say universally, but most of these projects are going to have some element of commercial. There's going to be a continuation of retail opportunities within the Rosemary District. I know the project that Dr. Mark Kauffman is doing, Rosemary Square — he's going to have something like 30,000 square feet of commercial space. That’s pretty significant. If you look at the occupancy in the Rosemary District, it's pretty much leased out.

How do you feel about the progress made on combating homelessness?

I feel more positive now than a long, long time. Home Resource is a ground zero when it comes to the chronic homeless situation in the Rosemary District. We've been dealing with it for 12 years. It's a tough way to run a business. I've been the president for most of that time — I’ve dealt with city managers, city commissioners and other city staff in an attempt to get someone committed to actually figuring out solutions to deal with the chronic homeless in Sarasota. I applaud the city for taking a step to hire Dr. Marbut, because I think he accelerated the commitment of both the city and the county to some extent. There has been progress made. (City Manager) Tom Barwin put an eight-point plan together. We're finally seeing positive steps. We're moving closer and closer to a plan that can be implemented.

How important is creating a cohesive district?

The Rosemary District has a large geographic footprint. When you think about going from (U.S.) 41 — which is where the Toasted Mango is — you can get breakfast, walk to Sam Alfstad’s place and check out the gallery and then perhaps walk over to Citrus Square and see what's going on there. The difference between that experience and the Main Street experience is, you're going to have retail and something to divert your attention throughout that whole journey on Main Street.

I think that's the opportunity for the Rosemary District — the more the development takes place, it's going to create more retail and infill that experience. Walking across the Rosemary District becomes an interesting adventure.

What’s your pitch to get people into the area?

If you haven't explored it, explore it. There are some great restaurants. There's an interesting beer garden. There's some galleries. There's plenty of good, interesting retail. There are hair stylists, a hookah bar. Even if you want to get your tires changed, there's a Goodyear. It's not something to fear. It's something to explore.