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Ruth Ashford: District 4 Candidate Focuses on Small
Businesses
By Fletcher Word
Sojourner’s Truth Editor
Toledo City Council
District 4’s business sections – downtown, UpTown and the
warehouse district – are pockmarked with abandoned buildings
and empty lots. Nowhere is the district anywhere close to a
pedestrian’s paradise.
Ruth Ashford, candidate
for the District 4 seat vacated by Mayor Paula Hicks-Hudson,
has turned her attention to the area’s blight and the need
to bring entrepreneurs into the area to ramp up activity.
“Activity draws people to the area,” she says.
“For small business
owners, there needs to be incentives to come downtown,”
Ashford adds.
An example of the types of
businesses so sorely needed is Salon Onyx, she says. Salon
Onyx, a full-service salon located in the Davis Building at
123 N. Michigan Avenue, has been in operation for about
three and a half years, says owner/operator Alina Dunbar.
Dunbar’s business includes
four stylists, two nail technicians and an aesthetician.
Clients, who come from all over the greater Toledo area,
have access to waxing, facial, massage and makeup services.
In order to bring her
salon to the downtown area, Dunbar and her husband had to
build the business from scratch – a gutted out storage area
in the Davis Building. The result is a large,
well-decorated, inviting space that complements the other
businesses in the building such as Sophie’s Sister and Pam’s
Corner. Clients can park on the street or in the lot at the
back and walk through.
“I am doing what I want
and this has been my dream,” says Dunbar, a Toledo native
who has been a cosmetologist for over 20 years.
Salon Onyx grants Dunbar
the opportunity not only to practice her craft and make a
profit but also to place emphasis on how she practices that
craft – ethically and professionally.
“Professionalism is first
and foremost,” she says of her approach to customer service.
One of these days, Dunbar hopes to go into teaching so that
she can impart that approach to others and ensure that she
is “laying a good foundation with young people.”
“She can be so
inspirational to so many young people in many ways,” adds
Ashford. “From getting their finances together to drawing up
business plans., this should be a life class that they can
come to. Other young people ought to aspire to doing what
she has accomplished here.” |
