Cleve Ricksecker is president of SID Public Services Association, an organization that operates two special improvement districts in downtown Columbus.   Assessments generated by the SIDs pay for the management of the public realm, capital improvements, a transit pass program, landscaping, and promotional services.    

The Organization’s innovative safety program has won awards from the National Homeland Security Association and Ohio Community Policing Association.   Readers of the national publication, Streetsblog, named Downtown C-pass the best transportation policy decision in the United States for 2017. It has also received local awards for homeless outreach, regional collaboration, planning, supporting tourism, downtown-wide recycling, and event production.

Prior to working with downtown property owners to create and operate business improvement districts, Cleve served as Executive Director of the Riverfront Commons Corporation.  He managed the process for creating a plan for developing the Scioto and Olentangy riverfronts in the downtown area that serves as a framework for projects currently being executed by the City of Columbus.

Cleve Ricksecker served as Executive Director of the Short North Business Association for five and a half years.  There, he directed promotions for the Short North commercial district and forged a consensus among area stakeholders to pursue several, long-range projects. They included the country’s only speculative commercial development over an interstate highway and the creation of a special improvement district in the Short North that financed 17 iconic arches along the neighborhood’s commercial spine.

Before working in the Short North, Cleve managed the Columbus Arts Festival for and served in several capacities at Capital University Law School.

Ricksecker is a licensed attorney.  He is an urbanite who has lived 58 of his 66 years without a personal vehicle and whose children proudly attended Columbus City Schools.  He lives with his wife, Lisa Fry, in the Short North.