Insecurity exists in the absence of knowledge.
... Unknown author
The Tribune has had its say – and powerfully so – so now it’s the Gang of Four News Agency’s day to obfuscate and crow:
Scribner Place funding rethought; Councilman fears city’s cost will rise, by Ben Zion Hershberg (short shelf life for Courier-Journal links).
Several members of the New Albany City Council are planning an 11th-hour effort to rescind funding for the Scribner Place downtown development project, saying the city can't afford it.
But council President Jeff Gahan said yesterday that it's unlikely that a resolution to eliminate the city funding — expected to be $137,500 a year for 16 years — would get the five votes it needs for passage.
Councilman Dan Coffey, who plans to ask for a vote Thursday on such a resolution, said he thinks the vote will be close — perhaps 5-4. He said he's not sure which way it will go.
Pliant as ever, the C-J’s GFNA stenographer duly records the tired and one-dimensional litany of objections to Scribner Place (and all hope of human progress) as numbingly chanted by CM Dan “The Great Reneger” Coffey and council ally CM “Slippery” Larry Kochert, noting the enthusiastic participation of CM Steve “Whatever it is, I’m against it” Price in any project that can be artfully wedged into the no-growth gospel as preached by the no-debt Dave Ramsey, but failing to speculate on the current position of CM Bill Schmidt, who had remarkably little to say – about anything – at the last council session on June 5.
It is widely assumed, and not without justification considering his record during the past two years, that CM Schmidt is the fourth vote in favor of CM Coffey’s excremental and capitulatory resolution against revitalization.
(Speaking only for myself, I hope it isn’t true, and that CM Schmidt rejects the entreaties of his colleagues as they advocate a thinly veiled kneecapping of the city’s and their grandchildren’s futures. It is almost unspeakably sad that CM Schmidt’s recent collusion with the openly avowed enemies of progress has perhaps irrevocably tainted the previously solid and unimpeachable legacy of his career serving the community.)
Meanwhile, the past two weeks have seen a yet another flurry of networking and advocacy by sincere and capable citizens, especially those who live and work downtown, aimed at affirming support for Scribner Place – and significantly, by purely logical extension, standing tall for the principles of downtown revitalization that can and have been objectively surveyed and found to be successful in cities with situations similar to New Albany's.
Consequently, CM Dan Coffey’s Scribner Place resolution must be seen for what it really is, and not for what the disingenuously devious Wizard of Westside claims it is.
Readers, do not be deceived by the “we can’t afford it” mantra of the council’s obstructionists, which in and of itself is patently absurd, but incorrectly serves to obscure what they’re really saying, and saying more loudly – and desperately – now that their latest feeble bluff is being called and its true nature observed:
We are undereducated, unmotivated, and eternally suspicious of those who succeed, and furthermore, in political terms, if we must choose between abject and humiliating failure and permitting a Mayor we openly detest to pursue and to receive credit for progress, we consciously and happily choose failure, because at the primal level of our dysfunction, failure is the devil we know.
Time and again over the past two years, the right side of the council table has waged sneering, chortling, cowardly war against knowledge, reason and simple decency.
How many times have trained professionals been ritualistically abused by a high school dropout with a second-tier Napoleonic complex?
How often have the interests of the downtrodden been cited as the very reason why nothing should be attempted to assist them?
How often has it been doubted publicly that the city and its people will ever recapture the spirit that once made it bright and vibrant, and that instead, we must surrender and starve the city of investment rather than fighting back?
How often have ignorance, spite and peevishness been declared political virtues, and deployed as weapons against the very people whose abilities, interests – yes, and money – are valued and appreciated in other cities where revitalization has succeeded?
NA Confidential has been known to embrace the theatrics of agitprop, but when it comes to the issue of Scribner Place and CM Coffey’s council resolution to shamelessly bludgeon it into oblivion, we needn’t resort to rhetoric. It's culture war, pure and simple: Coffeyism vs. Modernity.
But we have eschewed sensationalism, choosing instead to present the arguments on behalf of the Scribner Place project specifically and downtown revitalization generally -- and so have the individuals and organizations in New Albany who are best trained, best placed and best able to parlay the relatively minuscule investment required for Scribner Place's completion into reality-based revitalization trends ... into progress, something New Albany's seen little of during the past two decades.
Search this blog for “Scribner Place,” and read what we’ve been saying about it, but pour a cup of coffee first. Being "for" anything requires much effort, much explanation, and many sources of information, while being "against" usually comes down to one word: "No."
In opposition to our stance, we’re being offered a potpourri of selective numbers, treated to the cancerous malevolence of the congenital fear-mongers among us, and urged to accept with resignation a wretched, discredited civic and political tradition of dysfunctional underachievement.
Success or failure? It’s an easy choice for us, but you make the call.
A new and fresh demographic … or the same barbecued slathered bologna?
A Blackberry … or the Brambleberries?
Increased investment from outside the community … or accelerated decay from within?
The known economic and social benefits of education … or New Albany’s detriment at its ongoing degradation?
Ordinance enforcement … or slumlord enthronement?
Success … or failure?
Masterful, sir, masterful!
ReplyDeleteOne wonders if this column, submitted to the GFNA's editors, would be printed, or would Ben's superiors continue to ignore the dysfunctional beat reporting that passes for "journalistic" coverage of New Albany and Floyd County?
The way the CJ covers southern Indiana is a joke! I once heard that BH calls one of the Cm and ask what they want printed. As of now, I believe it!
ReplyDeleteCm Coffey's idea is just plain wrong! The sewers need to pay for themselves from the users. We are not living in the 60's anymore, a loaf of bread does not cost 29 cents, a gallon of milk is not 79 cents. The cost of living has increased, so goes the cost of disposal of sewage.
I think the mayor ought to sell the sewage department off too! That way the politics are out of it! We will not have to hear how someone will loose one vote if they vote to raise the fees. Besides if private shareholders owned the stock, there would no way someone could not pay there bill.
Picture this! A large tandem axial dump truck pulling a backhoe arrives in front John Doe's house. The backhoe quickly digs a large hole at the edge of the curb, the sewer line is located, a six inch section is cut out, where a worker drives a big a$$ wooden plug into the end of Mr. Doe's line. Mean time at the courthouse the Sewers- R-Us lawyer is placing a lien on Mr. Doe's property.
And not one councilman lost a single vote!
It's time to move on, let's stop whipping Scribner Place, but lets do get the sewers fixed. It seems strange that no matter how much Cm. Coffey shouts out we can not afford it, in the same breath he says he is not informed. Which is it, can we not afford it? And if we can't how do you know, if you’re not informed, sounds like a catch 22. (Catch 22 is another term used in the government, like double-dipping, which originally meant, a retired government worker could not receive retirement from the government and social security at the same time, not what Cm Price keeps referring to!) Many company presidents sit other companies Board of Directors, for this they are compensated. No different than the mayor getting his monthly salary and additional funds from the various boards he presides over. It's the American corporate way things are done.
I realize this is way off topic but there is no other forum. Why does "freedom of Speech" ask so many questions but offer no means to respond?
ReplyDeleteA theologian said this in the early 1900's:
ReplyDelete"The lack of a grand vision, the tangle of unresolved problems, political paralysis, mediocre political leadership with little insight or foresight, and in general too little sense for the commonweal are seen everywhere."
Hans Kung
Things haven't changed much
He who has eyes, let him hear; He who has ears, let him hear; and he who has a functional mind, let him comprehend!
ReplyDeleteWell done NAC!
Well I screwed that one up! Eyes don't hear, they SEE!
ReplyDeleteMiles Davis once stated that
ReplyDelete"Jazz is dead". So has the City of NA died and in dire need of a resurrection?
Once again, all this chatting here on this blog and not a soul has stated, I'll be the one to step forward with a vision and be the leader of this new team called progress for a new and improved New Albany.
I read this well thought out blog every day and refrain from making sarcastic comments, because in my heart I believe in what is trying to be down here on a grass roots level. For the most part, we all desire the same things and are willing to make many sacrifices for a better way of a quality community living for all. The hard part is trying to convince the populace of NA that what they already have is so out dated, that it is in a much needed state of repair. The people whom "represent" us are milking us dry before our very eyes, but yet making all of us play the fool in this opera/comedy of errors.
Matt said ... "I realize this is way off topic but there is no other forum. Why does "Freedom of Speech" ask so many questions but offer no means to respond?"
ReplyDeleteExcellent question, Matt.
Given that "Erik" actually is one, or most likely two, disaffected local ladies, neither of whom is a professor, and who receives regular information leaks from a city council member's wife ... does anyone really have a reasonable expectation of fairness, consistency or "freedom or speech"?
In short, it's because the masked bloggers are terrified of dialogue, meaning they're terrified of free speech, meaning that the blog's title is best understood as ironic.
Except that none involved are capable of grasping irony.
Hmm. Only in New Albany ... and these are the people we're supposed to believe?