LIVE TO EAT: Food for thought from Ryan Rogers.

The umbrella.

We like to say in the restaurant business that we can tell consumers what our restaurant is, but within six months, our consumer tells us what the restaurant is.
-- Ryan Rogers

For those with the wherewithal to elude Louisville Business First's paywall, there is an excellent short interview by Haley Cawthon with Ryan Rogers, founder of Feast BBQ, Royals Hot Chicken and bar Vetti.

You'll recall that his first restaurant was the now defunct Feast BBQ in New Albany (2012-2018), currently being remodeled as an addition to The Exchange.

Rogers' sentiments about Louisville's restaurant industry are worth noting.

Chef Ryan Rogers talks Royals expansion, Louisville restaurant industry

What’s your opinion on Louisville’s restaurant industry? Do you think it’s overly saturated?

I think it’s a healthy restaurant market. At the end of the day, the restaurants give the best service, the best food and the best value are the ones that are successful. I think competition is good in the marketplace.

The one thing I would say is that we have a lot of people who want to get in the restaurant business because they see it from the outside and think it’s a fun job to have. But it’s a job at the end of the day — it’s not a retirement plan or something you do as a hobby — it’s a seven day a week job.

I think that competition will only continue to improve the quality of the restaurants that we have in Louisville.

Did I pass Victor Grossman on the street in East Berlin in August, 1989?

East Berlin, 1989.

I've heard of Victor Grossman, recalling his name from the period in the late 1980s when I abstracted geopolitical and current events magazine articles.

My job was discarded in order to travel abroad in 1989, a trip that included my first and only month in East Germany, where I spent three weeks as a paid employee of the East Berlin Parks Department. The Berlin Wall fell just before I returned home circa November.

As someone fascinated by the place and the period, I find this interview with Grossman to be compelling. Much of what he says strikes me as plausible in the sense that East Germany surely did establish a level playing field for much of its population with respect to fundamental living conditions.

But whatever the word "freedom" actually means, and we might debate this until the end of time, there wasn't enough of it in East Germany.

If there had been, East Germans eager for something more wouldn't have been streaming across the Hungarian border into Austria, in route to West German citizenship. The hemorrhaging was something ongoing during my stay in East German, although I didn't really understand it; speaking no German explains part of the fog, with the remainder owing to the fact of there being no independent sources of media information.

It was pre-internet, and you couldn't just go to a newsstand and pick up a diverse assortment of publications. At any rate, three decades later Grossman speaks for himself quite capably. Geography, politics and history buffs, you'll want to click through, read and absorb. Who knew Grossman was even still alive?

From Harvard to East Berlin: An Interview with Victor Grossman, by Julia Damphouse and David Broder (Jacobin)

In 1952 the Harvard grad Victor Grossman defected to East Germany, hoping to help build socialism on the ruins of Nazism. Thirty years after that state collapsed, he insists that we should see it as a land of contradictions, not just a totalitarian monolith.

Victor Grossman is the only person to have earned degrees from both Harvard and East Germany’s Karl Marx University. Born in New York in 1928, he joined the Communist Party as a Harvard economics student before being drafted as a GI in occupied Germany. From there he defected to the East, swimming across the Danube into the Soviet-controlled part of Austria before making his home in the self-styled German Democratic Republic (GDR).

Having been an eyewitness to the postwar Red Scare in the United States and the onset of McCarthyism, Grossman became an ardent defender of East German socialism. Even after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, which brought the GDR to its final collapse, he has continued to live in the former East Berlin, writing of the social hardships caused by the sell-offs of formerly publicly owned workplaces, services, and housing.

Grossman recently toured the United States to promote his latest book, A Socialist Defector: From Harvard to Karl-Marx-Allee. Jacobin’s Julia Damphouse and David Broder met up with him to discuss the successes and darker aspects of the GDR, his own experience as an American on the “wrong side” of the Cold War divide, and what legacy the twentieth-century left has for the recent resurgence of socialism in the United States.

If local "progressives" aren't holding City Hall's feet to the fire about Housing Choice vouchers, are they really progressive?

According to the Green Mouse, the last time a News & Tribune reporter was allowed into the inner sanctum for an interview with Mayor Jeff Gahan, there was a precondition that all questions first be submitted for approval by City Hall.

The answers were printed and ready when the reporter entered the mayor's office, and after a few moments of small talk, so ended the "interview."

Welcome to non-transparent governance, Nawbany-style.

Way back on March 16, 2017, the newspaper's then-reporter Elizabeth Beilman provided an overview of Gahan's recently facilitated hostile public housing takeover. While only Beilman herself knows whether her questions required City Hall pre-approval, here's a paragraph of interest.

(Gahan's NAHA seizure) will also signal a paradigm shift that more closely mirrors the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s changing model for public housing — fewer “brick-and-mortar” options and more affordable housing flexibility through a voucher system. Gahan believes this will position New Albany for better success when applying for tax credits and other applications.

Beilman also spoke with David Duggins, appointed by the mayor to serve as Gauleiter of the annexed NAHA territories.

New Albany is instituting measures meant to open up more opportunities for affordable housing that will accept Housing Choice Vouchers, Duggins said.

The city’s recently updated comprehensive plan states any new private housing development that receives incentives from the city, such as tax breaks, would be required to set aside 8 percent of its units for voucher holders, Duggins said. The plan was passed unanimously by the city council.

The council also approved an ordinance requiring landlords to register their rental units with the city. An inspection component of the ordinance was removed by the council, but city officials hope registration of units will increase communication with property owners to prevent deterioration of homes.

“If we start now encouraging affordable development, if we work now and enforce 8 percent [reserved units for vouchers], then there are units that will be available as this goes through,” Duggins said. “It will simultaneously work together, but it is a process.”

And if voucher holders can’t find eligible housing in New Albany when the time comes?

“I think we’re happy that they would go and find any place — if it’s in the city, great, if it’s outside the city that makes them happy and gives them a quality of life that they’re looking for, I think that’s the whole concern,” Duggins said.

It's almost as if both Gahan and Duggins knew their words about the utility of Housing Choice vouchers were meaningless drivel even as they uttered them -- as Chen discusses below.

Someone should ask them.

The newspaper, perhaps?

Better yet, shouldn't the so-called local Democratic Party progressives -- who insist against all prevailing evidence that Gahan and Duggins are somehow "one of them" -- be the ones to ask the occasional hard question?

Or must those queries, too, be approved in advance?

Our Housing-Voucher Program Is Broken, Michelle Chen (The Nation)

Landlords regularly refuse to rent to voucher holders, defeating the point of the program.

For many families in impoverished communities, their best hope for escaping poverty is to just move out of it. But often, the poverty follows them: They struggle to find a better neighborhood they can actually afford in crowded, expensive local housing markets. Today, with poverty and underfunded schools so intensely concentrated in isolated enclaves, the nationwide housing crisis is as much a crisis of segregation as a crisis of affordability.

The federal department of Housing and Urban Development has sought for years to help poor families relocate to lower-poverty areas through the Housing Choice program, which provides rental vouchers as a one-way ticket out to a healthier and stabler environment, resettling families in peaceful, integrated neighborhoods with more job and educational opportunities. Housing Choice vouchers are a major resource for cash-strapped public-housing authorities, currently supporting about 2.2 million households nationwide. Calculated according to income, the subsidies allow tenants generally to pay no more than 30 percent of income for rent. That could mean the difference between a roach-infested studio and a sunny single-family duplex with a $400 higher monthly rent. Those savings have a way of trickling down to the next generation, too: Research has linked a better home environment to healthier child development, less social distress, and greater economic stability. But as Congress weighs a modest expansion of the program, researchers have found that the Housing Choice recipients tend to face stiff barriers of stigma and implicit bias.

According to an extensive field study by the Urban Institute, many voucher holders are thwarted by landlords who simply won’t rent to them, regardless of the subsidy. Although some cities have laws that explicitly ban landlords from denying someone solely on the basis of being a voucher holder, researchers say subsurface biases still color first impressions and shape housing opportunity. It seems that people with vouchers are, ironically, perceived the same way landlords would view a bad credit check or a criminal record—a sign of a potentially troublesome tenant ...

From Food & Dining (Spring 2018, Vol. 59): My interview with Bert Beveridge, founder of Tito's Handmade Vodka.

When the current issue of Food & Dining Magazine comes out, it is my habit to glance back at the previous quarterly edition and reprise my contributions.

In this instance, it's Spring 2018 (Vol. 59; Feb-Mar-Apr), and my profile of the Chef Space kitchen incubator, and interview with Bert "Tito" Beveridge.

First up, the vodka maker. The Chef Space profile will appear in a separate post.

---

THE MULE’S FROM MOSCOW, BUT THE VODKA’S STRICTLY LONE STAR.

Tito’s Handmade Vodka became the top-selling spirits brand in America by keeping it simple and fostering an enthusiastic fan base.

Vodka remains huge in the United States, and yet the libation’s perceived essence as a colorless, odorless spirit tends to deprive it of the adulation inspired by whiskeys, gins and cognacs.

To me, the 20th-century history of vodka in America makes perfect sense in a geopolitical, Boris and Natasha, ex-Cold War sort of way, seeing as vodka was barely known here until after World War II, when a brand called Smirnoff occupied a leading position in the liquor trade.

Ironically, Russian imagery propelled a popular cocktail known as the Moscow Mule -- the Volga Boatman never really caught on -- and Smirnoff inspired countless Slavic knock-offs spanning the gamut from Popov to Kamchatka to Dark Eyes (a famous Russian folk song).

What better tactic to one-up the Soviets than boldly appropriate their national beverage for capitalism’s greater good, whether as partner to an ocean of tonic water or a willing enabler for countless restorative Bloody Marys?

In recent years vodka has exploded past all former limitations of national origin and price point to become as diverse and specialized as any other type of tipple, but aside from waffle-flavored vodkas distilled according to ancient Druid techniques, exactly how did a regular guy from Texas create a craft vodka that recently toppled the perennial powerhouse Smirnoff as America’s number one spirits brand, hurdling other famous names like Bacardi, Jack Daniels and Jose Cuervo, and in the process completely reordering the American vodka hierarchy?

I’m speaking of Bert “Tito” Beveridge and his creation, Tito’s Handmade Vodka, which dates to humble beginnings two decades ago in Austin, Texas.

Tito’s Handmade Vodka’s success is even more unique given that it is the sole product of an independent distilling company, without the corporate reach or pocketbook of companies like Brown-Forman or Diageo.

Consumers love the Tito’s Handmade Vodka back story, and the enthusiasm extends to bartenders, retail managers and wholesale liquor professionals like Scott Clark of Southern Glazer’s.

“Tito’s is now the standard, with undeniable deals in marketing, point of sale and product support,” said Clark. “In the decade I’ve been selling wine and spirits in Southern Indiana, I’ve never seen this massive a scale of growth in any product, especially in the vodka category.

“It’s family-owned, handmade and gluten-free – but most importantly, Tito’s has become the preferred flavor profile when my customers think about drinking vodka.”

Beveridge was raised in San Antonio and graduated from the University of Texas. He worked in the oil, gas and mortgage businesses before concluding that his hobby of infusing vodkas with flavorings (given as gifts to friends) might actually form the basis of a career.

For Beveridge, “handmade” meant hands-on. He famously grappled with government bureaucrats who hadn’t read their own overstuffed rulebooks, maxed numerous credit cards, cobbled together a still worthy of the surgeons on M*A*S*H, and got to work fashioning vodka from corn.

Sales of Tito’s Handmade Vodka have risen from 12,000 bottles in 1997 to 44 million in 2016, helping to explain Beveridge’s 2017 debut on the Forbes 400 list or richest Americans; with an estimated net worth of $2.5 billion, he ranks 324th.

Earlier this year, I had the chance to ask Beveridge a few questions by e-mail.

---

F & D: When you were young, before you got into the spirits business, what did vodka mean to you – or what did you think it meant at the time? Have you expanded on this notion, or reinvented it?

Tito: In the early 1990s, I lived in Austin and worked in the mortgage business when I started making flavored vodka for my friends as Christmas presents. I was at a party one time and a stranger came up to me and said, ‘Hey you’re the vodka guy’ and I was like ‘No, I am the mortgage guy.’ That’s when I kinda started thinking that this guy’s telling me I need to go sell my flavored vodkas, and this was the first time I really started thinking seriously about it. Today vodka is my means to make the world a better place.

F & D: Napoleon supposedly said “Geography is destiny.” How important is the heritage of Texas, your birthplace, in the brand identity of Tito’s Handmade Vodka?

Tito: Texas is home. I was born and raised here, I established the first legal distillery here and it’s my friends and family here in Texas who all helped me get to where I am today.

F & D: What’s the advantage of a pot still versus a column still?

Tito: Our process, the pot still process, is similar to those used to make fine single malt scotches and high-end French cognacs. It requires more skill and effort than other processes, but it's well worth it.

F & D: To my taste buds Tito’s Handmade Vodka is remarkably smooth with a slightly sweet edge that I’d attribute to corn. Does corn make a difference in the flavor profile?

Tito: Since our vodka is distilled from corn, it is naturally gluten free and has a smooth, slightly sweet mouth feel. Some producers add a little bit of mash back into the spirit after distillation, which would add gluten content into an otherwise gluten-free distillate (if using wheat as the base), but I don’t do that, regardless. We’ve found that this flavor profile complements both cocktails and neat drinks just the same.

F & D: I don’t recall seeing a television ad for Tito’s Handmade Vodka, but years ago I was intrigued by seeing ads in the New York Times. Your chosen style of “guerrilla” marketing as a way of competing with the bigger bankrolls is intriguing. Has word of mouth been a big part of the vodka’s success?

Tito: You’re correct. We’ve never done a TV ad and aren’t planning on any in the future. We attribute a large part of our success to our fans. Back in the day, my family and friends used to come to the distillery and help me bottle the vodka. At the end of the day I’d send them home with a case and ask them to pass it along to their friends. Then they’d pass a bottle to their friends and so on. Eventually people started asking for us at their local bars and they didn’t stop asking until we were behind the bar. Now with social media, we have a direct line to our customers 24 hours a day. It’s allowed us to connect with our fans all over the world. We like to think of it as word of mouth on a much larger scale.

F & D: Is there any part of the ascent that you’d do differently if given a second chance?

Tito: I’m a firm believer that everything happens for a reason, so I wouldn’t change a thing. You know, there are small challenges every day, especially thinking back to those initial days of building the distillery. A lot of people told me it couldn’t be done, but I knew what I wanted to do. I used my previous failures as my strength and didn’t stop, and twenty years later, here we are.

F & D: Have you thought about legacies? Where do you see the company ten years from now, and is there a strategy for staying on top -- or is just being near the top enough?

Tito: For me, I hope the “legacy” goes beyond the vodka. Back when I started this, I also started supporting charity events around Austin one bottle at a time, and gave away a ridiculous amount of vodka. We’ve grown a lot since then and in every new place we were able to reciprocate by pouring that love back into the people and organizations that nurture, support and empower their local communities and causes. Last year we were able to use this medium to give to local, national and global charities supporting disaster relief, the environment, military and veterans, health care and medical research, food and beverage industry workers, arts and culture organizations, the LGBTQ community and the truest form of love on the planet: our pets.

F & D: Speaking of pets, your love for dogs is obvious and touching. Can you explain “Vodka for Dog People”?

Tito: Our passion for animals goes back to the first days at the distillery. At the time, my only companion at the distillery was my German Shepherd mix, DogJo. DogJo's food became a hit with the neighborhood strays, and I began to feed the dogs who would come and go. Eventually I started getting the strays spayed and neutered at the nearby Emancipet, an organization that offers low-cost spay, neuter and vaccination services to dogs and cats. Today, we still work with Emancipet and still have our dogs with us at the distillery and in the office. We can’t really imagine it any other way. Two years ago, we made our passion official with the Vodka for Dog People program. This vision is to unite with our friends, fans and partners to better the lives of pets and their families far and wide.

---

So, how has Beveridge done it?

Tito’s Handmade Vodka’s success owes to quality distilling, hard work, and maybe even a little luck, but it’s community-building and shared values among the brand’s friends and fans that bring them back for the next round.

Tito’s Handmade Vodka 
Tito’s at Facebook
Tito’s at Instagram 
Vodka for Dog People 

More about Hoosier Action, and a reminder: We Are New Albany.

Don't forget: there's an on-line petition to sign.

Meet WE ARE NEW ALBANY, and tell Jeff Gahan: No demolition of public housing without a plan to replace!

In Spring 2017, New Albany, Indiana Mayor Jeff Gahan announced his intention to demolish more than half of the town's public housing stock. Apart from vague promises of housing vouchers, residents have been told almost nothing about the plan or what will become of them. Sign the petition: No demolition without a plan to replace!

Learn more about Hoosier Action in this interview from July.

Organizing in the Heartland: Indiana Group Builds Working-Class Momentum, by Sarah Jaffe (Truthout)

Today we bring you a conversation with Jesse Alexander Myerson, an organizer with Hoosier Action who hosts an Indiana-based podcast called From the Heartland about people who are organizing in the interior of the country and in places where leftists aren't normally thought of as being.

Just a snippet.

Telling these stories is an important part of this kind of organizing, but you can also end up with people thinking that just telling a sad story is going to be enough to move their senator and then wondering why that doesn't work. I would love for you to talk a little bit more about the way this storytelling does and doesn't fit into your organizing strategy.

It is definitely integral. As you imply, it is not sufficient unto itself, but basically, the essence of the organizing we are doing is relational. The idea is that any organizing that takes place absent the building and deepening of relationships between people is going to be basically facile. It is one thing if you can get 12 people in a room to talk to us and it is another thing if you get 400 and that 400 really only comes when people have deepened their relationships with one another.

A lot of this organizing is based on having long one-on-one discussions with people, what their lives are like, what they are interested in, what they are concerned about, what they are afraid of, what they are angry about, what they are hopeful for and growing relationships that way. That is both on the doors and ideally in follow-ups after people get knocked or called. Those stories are important in the actual day-to-day organizing, talking to people and letting them know who you are and finding out who they are. As a kind of public expression, really what we hope to do is to mobilize people with that, but ultimately that mobilization should turn into becoming a dues-paying member, coming to monthly member meetings, joining a team and taking on work. That can be going and knocking on doors, it can be doing data entry, it can be helping to promote issues or taking on a shift at the farmers market or at a county fair, flyering or taking petitions, but ideally it is not a high temperature sort of organizing such as you and I saw at Occupy Wall Street where it is lots of marches, lots of heat, lots of intensity.

Really, that emotional heat is being channeled into really well-functioning systems that people can take on discrete amounts of work that make sense with their working lives and their family lives, but that they can see serving to proliferate the organization.

ON THE AVENUES: You know, that time when Roger interviewed himself.

ON THE AVENUES: You know, that time when Roger interviewed himself. 

A weekly column by Roger A. Baylor.

And stay right here, 'cause these are the good old days.
-- Carly Simon, “Anticipation”

So long as we persist in delineating our messy, serendipitous lives according to sleek, clean calendar lines, there’ll be reviews, resolutions, tired December conclusions and fresh January beginnings.

These annoy me, and yet I’m as guilty of them as anyone, even if the utter indifference of the cosmos as a whole keeps me grounded ... most of the time.

Throughout the mayoral campaign, a prime objective was for "us" to speak of “we,” as opposed to “I.” This owed in part to the incumbent’s bizarrely swollen head, although my antipathy to cults of personality has resulted from personal experience as well as perusing books every now and then.

During the course of my own years in beer, there have existed periodic temptations to indulge in precisely this sort of self-deification. Regrettably, I wasn’t always immune to periods of relaxed vigilance, which are characterized by reading one’s own press clippings and actually believing what they say.

What kept me grounded most of the time was the simple realization that I was part of a team, and the daily efforts of the team resulted in satisfied customers, who returned and made possible the survival of the business. I played one role, and it was just that: One part among many, inter-related, and meaningless when separated from the whole.

Perhaps politics inevitably works somewhat like this, and perhaps it doesn’t, but either way, the very notion of a personality cult is deeply offensive to me. What’s more, the greater our proximity to it, the more indefensible such an indulgence becomes.

Never again.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll conclude this column by talking about myself.

---

Your continued questions about my professional life are flattering, humbling and deserving of some answers. Insofar as there is verifiable truth to tell, I will try to dispense it, though be advised that as yet, the year 2016 is shrouded in fog and mystery.

Even I don’t know how it’s going to turn out.

1. What is your current status at the New Albanian Brewing Company?

The needle hasn’t moved for many months. As yet, I own 1/3 of New Albanian Brewing Co., Inc. (NABC Pizzeria & Public House) and 1/3 of New Albanian Bank Street Brewery, Inc. (Bank Street Brewhouse). Until I reach agreement with my two business partners to sell my shares to them, I’ll continue to enjoy the all risks of ownership without any of the commensurate rewards.

2. That’s odd – didn’t you already sell out?

No. Last year I stated publicly that it was my intent to sell my shares in the business to my business partners, and this objective has not changed. 25 years is long enough for me.

3. Okay, but is there a timetable for resolving this issue?

Yes, there is a mandated procedure according to our by-laws and buy/sell agreement. There have been desultory preliminary negotiations, but I have not initiated the timetable according to the mechanism specified in the buy/sell.

For one thing, it should come as a surprise to no one that the legalities involved are formidable. In addition, and perhaps more to the point, our buy/sell agreement makes no reference to my charitable donation of these shares. The verb “to sell” means something entirely different, or so we were taught at school.

4. So, to be completely clear: Are you involved with NABC on a daily basis in any fashion apart from ongoing issues pertaining to your unresolved ownership stake?

I am not involved at all, and to be honest, I do not expect to be involved during the transitional period. If you have questions or comments pertaining to NABC, I’ll try my best to direct them to someone who can help you. I have the utmost confidence in the abilities of employees and staff, and am happy to assist them if they need help.

5. What about the Brewers of Indiana Guild?

For so long as I retain an ownership stake in NABC, I remain on the board of directors of the Brewers of Indiana Guild. My enthusiasm for the advancement of the collective growth of brewing in Indiana is undiminished, and I hope to be able to participate in several upcoming guild projects. Of course, once my shares in NABC are sold, I’ll resign from the BIG board, and if for any reason the board feels it would be in the best interest of the guild for me to step aside, I will.

6. What are you doing with your time?

“I am at the moment writing a lengthy indictment against our century. When my brain begins to reel from my literary labors, I make an occasional cheese dip.”
― Ignatius J. Reilly, in A Confederacy of Dunces

Reading, writing, listening and learning.

My wife is elated at my rediscovery of home kitchen cooking, something I’ve always enjoyed. I walk several miles a day and have been maintaining reduced weight. Perhaps a resumption of bicycling will occur when the weather warms.

I’ve joined the board of New Albany IndieFest, and am preparing to more actively organize and promote the New Albany Restaurant & Bar Association. As with the Brewers of Indiana Guild, there is palpable liberation in working for the good of the collective, rather than always promoting one’s own business.

My relationship with beer is undergoing a necessary reinvention. With distance has come a greater measure of perspective, which I’ll be gradually documenting at the Potable Curmudgeon blog and my new Facebook page, Roger’s Simple Beer Pleasures. Localism interests me. Multinational capital accumulation does not.

A long-term goal is to unify my varied interests in beer, history and culture with past experiences in the beer business, hopefully arriving at an integrated program of education and entertainment. I want to get back to the notion of teaching.

Of course, the NA Confidential blog isn’t going anywhere, although I’d like to do some remodeling in 2016. Nick Vaughn has agreed to write a weekly column, and I’ve extended this offer to others.

7. Is it safe to say the job of mayor pays better than all this?

Yes, quite safe. I currently inhabit a pro bono world, but am forever open to suggestions. Whether I’m employable is one of the more intriguing questions in my life at present.

8. Are you still pursuing civic activism?

*SPOILER ALERT*

I find it exceedingly difficult not to have a viewpoint, and harder still not to express it.

Did someone say “civic activism”? Yes, indeed. The pursuit continues, even if the quarry is elusive. I’ve been knocked down, brushed back, blocked, besieged, blockaded, censored, defriended, unfollowed and trivialized.

However, I’m not discouraged in the least. Overall, we’ve only just begun. In the Land of C-Minus Students, being a dissident suits me, so don't expect it to change.

9. What about your spotty career in politics?

Having mastered the Seven-Per-Cent Solution, my next amazing trick is to hover around the exclusionary and gated periphery, an eyebrow jauntily cocked, looking for loopholes.

However, to quote Tricky Dicky, let’s make one thing perfectly clear. If Scott Blair and Dan Coffey both self-identify as "independent," then I might as well run for office next time as a socialist. These people are ruining my brand.

10. Do you have any final thoughts?

Absolutely, though you’ll have to keep reading to find out.

By the way, has that News and Tribune guest columnist position been posted yet?

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Recent columns:

December 31: ON THE AVENUES: My 2015 in books and reading.

December 24: ON THE AVENUES: Fairytale of New Albania (2015 mashup).

December 17: ON THE AVENUES: Gin and tacos, and a maybe a doughnut, but only where feasible.

December 10: ON THE AVENUES: Truth, lies, music, and a trick of the Christmas tale (2015).

December 3: ON THE AVENUES: Who (or what) is New Albany's "Person of the Year" for 2015?

Sleaford Mods: "There's not a lot of fresh air, so to speak."

"Ten years ago the Sleaford Mods frontman Jason Williamson was lucky if he could afford a Mars bar and a can of Special Brew."

I'll forever remember the period of my mayoral campaign as the time back in '15 when Sleaford Mods and New Albany became absolutely synonymous in my mind. Jason Williamson kept saying what I was thinking. Some might say associations like this were enough to disqualify me as a "serious" candidate.

I think they identified me as the ONLY serious candidate.

July 31, 2015: I am currently obsessed with Sleaford Mods.

Ethan Kent interview: Placemaking as antidote to "top-down solutions."

Given that so many of the New Albany governing clique's stalwarts view the sexist, racist and anti-Semitic myth merchant Walt Disney as some sort of god, perhaps it shouldn't come as a surprise that they keep patting citizens condescendingly on their heads, pointing the way to the water slide, and treating us like ignorant little children.

But you see, New Albany doesn't need any more multi-million dollar monuments to make-believe. We need a reality check, and win or lose, this is what I aim to provide in my race for mayor. I'd appreciate your support.

For me, loveability begins increasing once the need to channel and control urban management for purely political funding reasons begins receding. It's time to open this place up, not add further rings of hermetic security to the down-low bunker.

What Makes a City Great? It's not the Liveability but the Loveability, by Irene Pedruelo (Policy Innovations)

There is a lack of consideration for "place" in American urban planning that Ethan Kent finds concerning. It offends him the way ugly typography offends graphic designers. He works as senior vice president of Project for Public Spaces (PPS) in New York, where they are trying to turn the way we shape cities upside down. Over its 40-year history PPS has focused on turning public spaces into great places. How? Just visit their offices in Manhattan. The entrance is like the jungle.

An example of the question-and-answer:

IRENE PEDRUELO: Then why are many trying to suppress this kind of urban planning?

ETHAN KENT: The culture of global development is very much trying to order and organize chaotic streets and communities, often undermining the emergent creativity of these places. It is not to glorify the problems but it's to say that in some ways they are creating better public spaces, better community outcomes, than the more top-down solutions that are being introduced to solve their problems.

ON THE AVENUES: Say a prayer for NA Confidential as it conducts this exclusive interview with Councilman Cappuccino.

ON THE AVENUES: Say a prayer for NA Confidential as it conducts this exclusive interview with Councilman Cappuccino.

A weekly web column by Roger A. Baylor.

It’s an election year in New Albany, and to prove it, tonight’s city council meeting will be devoted in part to a consideration of whether the Lord’s Prayer should be reinserted into its twice-monthly agenda.

That's right, reinserted, when naturally this particular variant of invocation is nowhere to be found within the ordinances defining council. Mind you, the non-issue of how council conducts its meetings is not destined for the top of the charts with a requisite bullet, but of course this isn't the reason for Dan Coffey’s latest diversionary tactic.

When Coffey demands a resolution on the Lord’s Prayer, or bemoans the absence of a crucial audit, or abstains from a vote immediately following his vicious denunciation or hyperbolic praise of the precise topic at hand, you can be sure he is doing so for the very same reason your cat purrs, rubs your leg or piddles on the blanket.

Which is: He demands to be fed … and fed right now.

For those just tuning in to the abysmal shambles of New Albany’s underachieving city council, this is hardly Coffey’s first dance. As Yogi Berra probably never said, it’s déjà vu all over again.

We’ve been following his self-serving antics since the very advent of NA Confidential, having dubbed this most conniving of all local ward heelers twice, both as Councilman Cappuccino and the Wizard of Westside, the latter nickname coming from awed recognition of his unparalleled ability to catastrophically inject himself into city-wide matters from his tin pot’s perch in the numerically tiny 1st council district, while all the sheltering his constituents from any trace of genuine progress.

Unfortunately, the same might be said of the city at large. Turning back the pages of NA Confidential to April 17, 2005, we find remarkable symmetry between the times of our New Albanian lives then, and now – so much so that the drinking lamp might be lit today well before lunch.

In New Albany, we coddle the anti-social dim bulbs and purge the creative, bright lights.

Decades pass. Our worthiest sons and daughters – the bright, capable and eager future leaders of the city – get away from New Albany as fast as they can, far away from institutionalized slum lord debasement not just tolerated but welcomed over a period of four or more decades, away from the overcrowded and down market Harvest Homecoming that is our sole and only claim to infamy, away from a place where any good idea, any sign of intelligent life, any revolt against the lumpy mashed potato norm is dismissed and derided as craziness emanating from a book-reading, un-American queer who can just move the hell out if he or she doesn't like it here.

Do you think this characterization of traditional New Albany is somehow unfair? If so, we submit with all due respect that you have a strong coffee, look around you, and face the unpleasant facts of the matter.

All of it is true, it’s inexcusable, it's embarrassing, and the inescapable conclusion is that we’ve been purging the wrong elements all these years.

Go ahead. Pour the java and have a glance ... if you dare. Disturbing, isn’t it?

Apart from the recent frenzied construction of numerous shiny campaign empowerment objects via the gleaming ATM known locally as TIF, nothing much has changed here in New Albany. Granted, the Wizard has a grand new role, portraying an ever-faithful Sancho Clemenza to Jeff Gahan’s power-crazed Godfather Quixote, but insofar as Coffey’s real political life renders satire nearly moot, we’re stuck in a time warp.

Following is an “interview” first published on April 18, 2005. We hope Sherreff Duggins will note the proper use of quotation marks, although breaths are not being held here in the office.

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NA Confidential: Today in the studio we have a very special guest, the esteemed city councilman of long standing, Mr. Cappuccino.

Councilman Cappuccino: Thank you (preening) … now, where’s that red light? Citizens, just last week, as I spent quality time with my beloved hobby of antique furniture refinishing, which I’d gladly settle for doing in a heartbeat if not for the hopes and dreams of dozens of honest, salt-of-the-earth West Side families, who depend on me to bring home their bacon, improve their drainage, install their water heaters and protect them from the Ordinance Nazis – hah! Boy, that’s a real knee-slapper – I gotta thank my friend Li’l Stevie here (Cappuccino hoists a doll atop his knee) for coming up with the Ordinance Nazi phrase, right Li’l Stevie?

Li’l Stevie (former 3rd district councilman Steve Price): Yes sir, Mr. Cappuccino, you’re dead right, just like always … hey, there they are! NAZIS! NAZIS! Hide the video poker machine!

NAC: He’s certainly well-tanned.

CC: Did you say well tamed? It runs in the family. Hmm, like I was piously intoning … anyway, my downtrodden westsiders need me, and as the Wizard I whiz only for them, even if it kills me.

NAC: All right. Here’s our first question, Mr. Cappuccino. Do you support ordinance enforcement in the city of New Albany?

CC: Well, Knack, when it comes to enforcing the prevailing laws, we have to be extra careful to avoid those questionable practices that might be conscrewed as discriminatory. We must understand at all times that there’s a higher principle involved than just the exterior design tastes and storage practices of fine, church-going, taxpaying people who have chosen to make New Albany their homes, and that’s because they have a right to expect a certain level of respect for the lifestyles they’ve chosen to lead.

NAC: Are you talking about the higher principle of fairness?

CC: (Rolling his eyes) Fairness? That’s what those godless Louisvillians are always pushing. Heck, we have plenty of fairness in New Albany, just so long as you’re normal. (Cappuccino strikes a theatrical pose) No, not, fairness, but the very lifeblood of the city itself, without which we’d have nothing.

NAC: The rule of law?

CC: (Exasperated) Law, schmaw. No, VOTES! Can’t live with ‘em when they’re cast by those hoity toity East Enders, and can’t live without ‘em if they’re my neighbors on the West Side! They don’t call me the Wizard for nothing, you know. At the same time, my world-famous barbecued bologna cookouts only go so far, and at some point, you have to earn the respect of your constituents, and one great way to do that is to protect them from the heat.

NAC: Wait -- did you say barbecued bologna?

CC: Yes, I can smell it and taste it right now. My neighbor Marcelene cooks it up right. Cube the bologna, cook some onions in oil, throw in your favorite barbecue sauce, let it simmer … man, let me tell you, that’s living. Right Li’l Stevie?

LS: And you can put it in Tupperware, Mr, Cappuccino! Save it for a rainy day! Save it for a rainy day!

NAC: Mr. Cappuccino, what were your thoughts last year when the city of New Albany began enforcing the right of way for street sweeping?

CC: Quite frankly, it was a blatant attack on our cherished West End way of life – family, church, iced tea and the ice cream social, all under siege by the Silver Hills elite and the book-readin’ snobs. You know, I’d call it discrimination, maybe even genocide … if I knew what genocide meant …

NAC: To be perfectly honest, that sounds somewhat paranoid.

CC: You book learners are all the same, and it’s a good thing I don’t have to read those books to know what’s in ‘em for me. Listen, just because you’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean the pointy-heads aren’t out to get you. Every self-respecting ward heeler knows that ordinances are just like women – you’ve got to squeeeeze ‘em a little until they start making sense. Go and clean up the porno shop, and the people in the district love you. But when it comes to making them move the old appliances off the porch … well, that’s different. They’ll turn on you, vote against you, and all that tasty bologna’s wasted.

NAC: So, can you explain your vote in favor of ordinance enforcement?

CC: Of course I can. Like I said, I’m for it.

NAC: And what about your public statement that you are in favor of rental unit inspections?

CC: I’m for that, too.

NAC: But won’t you lose votes if such measures are adopted?

CC: There’s the rub, knacker. Being for 'em is one thing, but you didn’t hear me say anything about FUNDING them properly, did you? Or writing that ordinance so it'd have any chance of working?

NAC: Perhaps we’re beginning to understand the central equation.

CC: Don't you see? If we give the uppity East Enders and City Hall what they want, and then it doesn’t work out in the end … well, you just try and guess who gets blamed when it tanks – right Li’l Stevie?

LS: Right, boss!! My friends, I’m not anti-parks, and I’m not anti-progress … I’m anti-success!! No, wait, I mean I’m anti-egress!! No, that’s zoning-speak. I’m anti-Garner!! That’s it!! It's all his fault!!

CC: Yes it is. It’s kind of like the good spy, bad spy thing in Mad magazine.

NAC: Oh, so you read Mad magazine?

CC: NO! For the last time, I don’t read … but I know what people are writing. It’s a trick that Dick Nixon would have taught me if he would’ve been a Democrat … not that I was ever a Republican, mind you. Like I always say, be proud, be Democrat!

LS: NAZIS! NAZIS! They’re coming now, and they have books!!

NAC: But I thought the Nazis burned books?

CC: Who knows, but I’ve found that the biggest words tend to make the best open fire underneath that skillet of barbecued bologna.

NAC: But isn’t there an ordinance against open fires?

CC: Not where I come from, tenderfoot: The Wild, Wild West.

NAC: Unfortunately, that’s all the time we have today. Thanks to Mr. Cappuccino and Li’l Stevie for speaking with us today.

CC: Thanks, and just a quick reminder to my constituents – I have the keys to the crapper, if any of you need to use it.*

* At the time, Coffey was lobbying strenuously to be awarded the keys to the public toilet located at the park across the street from his house, so that he could lock it up each evening. The county parks department responded by demolishing it.

Houndmouth: Shane Cody speaks.

And Kevin Gibson is right there.

Houndmouth brings it on home for the Boomtown Ball, by Kevin Gibson (LEO Weekly)

Houndmouth performs Sunday in a triumphant homecoming at the city’s Boomtown Ball & Festival, a daylong downtown celebration. We caught up with drummer/vocalist Shane Cody on the road a couple of weeks ago. He greeted us by saying, “It’s good to see a 502 area code.”

"Moving forward" in year-end interview, Mayor Jeff Gahan says absolutely nothing about two-way streets.

Nope. Zilch. Cerro. Not a word.

But there's this, as it pertains to the construction of a recreational complex at the old Hoosier Panel property:

“I feel really good about what that’s going to do to the property values in that area, and again it’s an improvement to the quality of life in New Albany,” Gahan said of the recreational center.

If you live on or near one of downtown New Albany's one-way arterial streets, which are not sufficiently important to be so much as mentioned in this interview, isn't about time you began using the Q(uality of Life) word and asking City Hall and various boards that dictate infrastructure:

But what about OUR quality of life and property values? 

It seems increasingly evident that they're not going to mention it to you, first. Why? Because is  question they wish not to here, much less reply to.

Read it and weep. Louisville's supposedly Possibility City. I believe this makes us Oblivious City.

STATE OF NEW ALBANY: Gahan reflects, looks ahead; Mayor reaches midway point of term, by Daniel Suddeath (News and Tribune)

MOVING FORWARD

The next two years will be busy in terms of projects and improvements to New Albany, Gahan said.

There’s a planned expansion of the downtown Farmers Market, the establishment of a dog park and a project slated for this summer to rebuild some of the city’s flood gates and controls for the first time in 60 years.

Gahan also hinted that the administration plans on working with the council to update zoning codes in 2014.

An estimated $1.8 million project to improve Main Street is also scheduled for this year. Gahan said the administration is also moving forward with design plans to upgrade McDonald Lane.

He credited city employees for being dedicated to their jobs, and thanked New Albany residents for giving him a chance to serve.

“New Albany is a really great place to live when you compare it to other communities,” Gahan said. “I think what really sets us apart is we have a strong mix of friendly people.”

Jeff Speck on Walkability: "You have to separate downtown from other urban areas."

The interview is excellent, and touches on the high points of Specks' "Walkable City book, but notice in the introduction where the link leads: Straight to Amazon.

Jeff Speck on Walkability: The Livability Interview

The topic of walkability comes up quickly in most conversations about what makes a city a great place to live. While cars are often perceived as a freedom-producing device, having the freedom to get away from them, too, can be key. But what makes a city walkable? Jeff Speck, coauthor of the landmark bestseller Suburban Nation, is out with a new book entitled Walkable City. The book does a great job of outlining the necessary requirements for being a walkable city. You should read it, but I’ll give you a hint: It takes more than sidewalks. We spoke via phone about how walkability and livability relate and what other factors go into the livability equation. First off, he says, we need to fix the incentives. 

Livability: Are there places that aren’t walkable?

Mr. Speck: Most of sprawl is unfixable. Almost any city built before World War II, if it has any economic growth whatsoever, has a downtown that is ready to come back to life – if it hasn’t already. If we’re interested in growing into the 21st century in a sustainable way, our governments at every scale need to create programs that make it easier for people to move to those places and work instead of into sprawl.

Part 1: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price’s interview responses.

The primary election is two months away, but already the yard signs are in evidence. Yesterday while driving along Spring Street east of Vincennes, I noticed three “Re-Elect Steve Price” signs, two of which appeared to be adorning the front yards of duplexes. There is another located in front of the councilman’s rental properties across from the S. Ellen Jones Elementary School.

Somewhere in the placement, there lies a message.

Ironically, the topic of rental property inspections re-entered the blogosphere over the weekend. One of CM Price’s 3rd district challengers, Charlie Harshfield, has yet to enunciate a public position on this topic, while the other, former councilman Maury Goldberg, does not include it among the planks of his February 17 platform statement. Public statements, anyone?

Not so long ago, as part of a three-part interview published at NA Confidential, CM Price himself was asked, “Do you agree that New Albany should institute rental property inspections with real teeth? Why or why not?” His answer:

As a reminder, I spearheaded the cleanliness ordinance. I think homeowners’ period should take responsibility for their property. At the present time, I feel we need to focus on enforcing the established ordinances before entertaining new ones.

As a public service, NAC is reposting the Steve Price interview series in its entirety. Perhaps one or the other of his challengers – and perhaps a 3rd district voter or three – will find his non-answers illuminating.

(Originally posted in January, 2006)

Part 1: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price's interview responses.
Part 2: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price's interview responses.
Part 3: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price's interview responses.

Our original questions are numbered, and CM Price's original responses italicized. Commentary follows. Note that while two-thirds of the questions asked of CM Price were formulated by Jeff "Bluegill" Gillenwater, the commentary is entirely that of the blog owner. Jeff is invited to join the discussion, either as a team member or in comments, and of course, all readers are likewise encouraged to provide their thoughts subject to our identity policy.
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1. Mr. Price, you ran for council as a Democrat. How does your performance in council reflect your role as a Democratic Party officeholder? How can we separate your public statements from those of myriad Republicans over the past 40 years? Why are your stated preferences so different from the historic and progressive ideals of the Democratic Party? Does being a Democrat mean anything to you? What would that be, and how do you differentiate yourself from a Republican?

I am a 21st century Democrat who represents all the people. I believe in standing up for what is right and speaking out against injustice. New Albany is seeing first hand the repercussions of frivolous spending. History has been my teacher. I am not against “community-based” progress just force fed growth. It is not about trying to differentiate myself from anybody; it is about fulfilling the needs of the citizens of New Albany, and doing what will ensure a positive future for this city.

CM Price’s answer to the opening question sets the tone for the remainder of the interview by indicating clearly that either the specifics of the question elude him, or just as likely, he had no intention of risking an explication of them in the first place.

Along with 260 million fellow Americans embracing a myriad of political persuasions, CM Price claims to stand up for what “is right” and to “speak out against injustice.”

He provides no concrete examples of what these might be, or how his definition of “right” and “injustice” as a member of the Democratic Party differs from the perspective of the card-carrying Republican on the other side of the aisle.

Exactly when has CM Price taken the lead in “speaking out against injustice? Exactly what was the injustice?

In the overall context of political self-identification, CM Price’s choice of words seems quite odd, for in fact there is an organization called 21st Century Democrats, which has antecedents in the political campaigns of the late Paul Wellstone and former presidential candidate Howard Dean, and connections to another contemporary “blue” Democratic lobby group called Think Blue.

It should suffice to say that neither of these philosophies seem to be in harmony with what little of his personal political beliefs that CM Price is willing to let us glimpse in his answer to our first question.

Moreover, he moves with unseemly quickness to distance himself from the obvious burden of political self-examination by establishing the existence of his own personal bogeymen, “frivolous spending” and “force fed growth.” As you will see, these concepts are vital to CM Price’s narrow worldview, but they are not defined.

What is Steve Price in the political sense? He doesn’t tell us, but he strongly suggests that it is cautious, provincial and populist.

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2. Will you pledge to never abstain from a vote unless you can provide details, on record, of the conflict of interest that keeps you from voting?

Each vote is a separate matter to be evaluated through education and consideration before the vote is made. I will continue to vote, either by aye, nay or an abstention as it is best for my constituents. It is better to pause until further information is available than merely blindly rubber stamping.

For the record, here’s how Wikipedia defines abstention:

Abstention is a term in parliamentary procedure for when a participant in a vote is not absent, but does not cast a ballot. An abstention may be used to indicate the voting individual's ambivalence about the measure, or mild disapproval that does not rise to the level of active opposition

In the United States Congress and many other legislatures, members may vote "present" rather than for or against a bill or resolution, which has the effect of an abstention. In the United Nations Security Council, representatives of the five countries holding a veto power (including the United States, United Kingdom, France, Russia and the People's Republic of China) sometimes abstain rather than vetoing a measure about which they are less than enthusiastic, particularly if the measure otherwise has broad support.

It’s worth noting that while an abstention on the first reading of an ordinance might correspond with CM Price’s example of a “pause until further information is available,” that same could not be said when the vote has reached its final tally.

NAC trusts that in the future, CM Price will be willing and able to explain why a specific abstention is “best” for the 3rd District’s constituents.

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3. Can you please explain the concept of new urbanism and how its guiding principles may help New Albany?

The basic principle of new urbanism is a focus on neighborhood development, with the end resulting in obtaining a balance of living, working and playing spaces in a given area. It is a continuously growing city wide plan, where public input plays a vital role in its success. Creating places for children to play where parents can gather, designing pedestrian friendly shopping districts and affordable safe housing is not as simple as merely drawing a map and placing an “X” where there should be a park.

Anytime a city focuses on positive growth for its economy and residents a city will benefit from careful planning in those areas.

I feel New Albany is currently working on the ground floor of putting into action these principles by enforcing cleanliness ordinances already established, while making “smart” renovations to existing parks and unimproved land areas.

The concepts that have coalesced under the banner of New Urbanism are anything but staid, conservative and dull. Whether one agrees or disagrees with them, they are dynamic, active and transformational in nature. Here are three short descriptions gleaned from the Internet:

NEW URBANISM promotes the creation and restoration of diverse, walkable, compact, vibrant, mixed-use communities composed of the same components as conventional development, but assembled in a more integrated fashion, in the form of complete communities.

The New Urbanism is a reaction to sprawl. A growing movement of architects, planners, and developers, the New Urbanism is based on principles of planning and architecture that work together to create human-scale, walkable communities.

“Part of that revisionism is New Urbanism, which also has a strong social agenda. Those who think the point of New Urbanism is to make pretty middle-class suburbs don't know New Urbanism. The point is to reform the way we build and to make good, beautiful, walkable, diverse, sustainable places with a public realm worthy of ourselves.”

CM Price addresses these dynamic concepts of New Urbanism with characteristic tones of caution and reserve.

New Urbanism is about “planning,” he says, and requires “balance”; we must be “careful” in considering it, because it may not be “as simple” as it seems, and “smart” tweaking at the existing “ground floor” level must be undertaken before anything else.

Taken at face value, CM Price provides a workmanlike description of New Urbanism, albeit one with an underlying tone of suspicion. One might follow suit by describing the Mona Lisa as a famous painting in a museum somewhere.

We learn here that while the councilman (or someone close to him) possesses a rudimentary understanding of the genre, it comes with the congenital minimalist’s lack of enthusiasm and is absent any core commitment to its comprehension or perpetuation.

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4. Can you please explain how you intend to use your council position to advocate for those principles via legislative action? If you could give examples of successful legislation from other cities that have done a good job of improving housing and living conditions, it would be helpful.

The point of new urbanism is to serve the needs of the residents in the city. What is crucial to remember is the trends are only as useful as how they serve a particular community at a particular time.

It would be more useful to focus on serving the people who currently live in New Albany by revamping existing structures. I would use my legislative position to advocate for public dialogue of revitalization of existing city parks, how to improve the current parking situation in the downtown area and economic incentives for new downtown locally owned businesses.

I am a proponent of live entertainment, utilizing our riverfront in conjunction with the Greenaway. Live entertainment never goes out of style.

For a councilperson to “serve the needs of the residents on the city” surely is to fulfill only the most basic requirement of his or her job description, and can be accepted as a given in most cases. No one doubts the councilman’s sincerity on this fundamental point.

Consequently, the purpose of asking questions like ours is to determine how an elected official like Steve Price intends to set about identifying and “serving” these needs.

Thus, having been asked previously to define New Urbanism, and being able to provide no more than an unenthusiastic, “partial credit” response, CM Price now rushes to disavow any element of this unified and cogent theory of planning and development, perhaps fearing that such an acknowledgement implies a responsibility to inititate rather than to react, and to propose rather than oppose – to “restructure” rather than to “revamp.”

To lead, rather than to follow.

More clearly than ever, CM Price serves notice that he is wary of “trends,” and intends to remain firmly rooted in the realm of community band-aids for “existing structures” that serve the “particular community,” i.e., his own milieu, his own people, his own upbringing, and a deeply conservative point of view reflected by a recent public comment to the effect that one example of “live entertainment (that) never goes out of style” is Chubby Checker.

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5. How do you think the city could improve its reputation and attractiveness within the circles of educated, creative, entrepreneurial people whose presence continues to be proven necessary for success in the 21st century economy?

21st century economy is moving towards being debt free; both on a household level as well as a governmental level. Until New Albany’s resolves our current fiscal situation how can we offer an incentive package to those individuals? Statistics tell us that people want to be part of a movement toward growth. Getting in on the ground floor so to speak. When dark clouds of fiscal burdens surround the boundaries of our city – what does that say to our perspective entrepreneurial people? We are a city who is incapable of living within a budget, who is wasteful with monies. The list could go on. How can we ask for monetary investments when we have given the perception of being incapable of handling our own finances?

Intentionally or otherwise, CM Price chooses not to dispute the fundamental gist of the question, which is to establish that the presence of “educated, creative, (and) entrepreneurial people” has been “proven necessary for success in the 21st century economy.”

Instead, he sneaks through the back door, offering this assessment of prevailing economic theory:

“21st century economy is moving towards being debt free; both on a household level as well as a governmental level.”

According to CM Price, New Albany is “wasteful,” “incapable of living within a budget, and unable to handle its “own finances,” and because of this, we must conclude that the city has nothing to attract investors.

What, then, has attracted the entrepreneurial cadres already at work downtown? Why haven’t they been frightened away?

For two years, we have listened to CM Price’s twangy homespun homiles about nickels, dimes and grandma’s cigar box, but in this instance, he’s the one mistakenly putting the cart before the horse.

Just perhaps the “educated, creative” and “entrepreneurial people” and their focused investments are what helps to bring financial stability and economic growth, and that their presence in a particular place has as much to do with factors such as real estate prices, proximity to recreational opportunities and lifestyle choices as anything else.

Perhaps the “incentive package” that’s best to offer such people isn’t cash, either directly or indirectly, but a receptive and hopeful attitude on the part of the existing community.

After all, these aren’t all outsiders, although some come from elsewhere; many were born and raised here, and left to seek greener pastures precisely because there was no encouragement for their skills and aspirations here in New Albany.

Perhaps the ones who have come here from other parts of the country aren’t interested in hearing the excuses for failure, but bring with them a can-do spirit that used to be part of New Albany’s fabric when it was young and growing.

To be sure, cities far more degraded than ours have managed to revitalize themselves in spite of less to work with than New Albany possesses. How have they done it?

It might be as simple as the will to succeed.

As a side note, and in closing today’s considerations, it’s worth pointing out that by his own admission, the works of the right-wing, debt-free financial guru Dave Ramsey have a heavy personal influence on Councilman Price.

The question, as yet unanswered, is whether Ramsey’s household realm of advice and theory is applicable to the “21st century economy” in the wider sense. CM Price implies that it is.

Is it?

Part 2: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price’s interview responses.

(Originally posted in January, 2006)

Part 1: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price's interview responses.
Part 2: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price's interview responses.
Part 3: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price's interview responses.

Our original questions are numbered, and CM Price's original responses italicized. Commentary follows. Note that while two-thirds of the questions asked of CM Price were formulated by Jeff "Bluegill" Gillenwater, the commentary is entirely that of the blog owner. Jeff is invited to join the discussion, either as a team member or in comments, and of course, all readers are likewise encouraged to provide their thoughts subject to our identity policy.

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6. What have you done or what will you do to express a clear preference for the redevelopment of existing city neighborhoods as opposed to continued sprawl?

New Albany in the past several years recognized the neighborhood associations. It has been a pleasure to watch a growing relationship between the associations and the city government. Maintaining an open line of communications between the two is a positive step toward redevelopment of existing neighborhoods. I have assisted the associations within my district as they work with city officials to devise and implement proactive problem resolutions. For instance, there was growing concern among my constituents regarding a car lot being placed in their highly residential neighborhood. I was able to help them voice their concerns to the city and reach a positive resolution.

Small communities within a larger city working to improve their particular area in relation to the city as a whole is yet another example of new urbanism planning in action.

I will continue to work with the existing groups that are dedicated to improving their piece of New Albany, Which in turn will improve New Albany as a whole.

CM Price’s most recent pronouncement on this topic came at the January 19 city council meeting, when he remarked that “9 out of 10” property developers just want to make money; having voted previously to approve exurban projects initiated by Gary “The Gary” McCartin, we’re left to surmise that the 10th developer referred to by CM Price as not being interested in profit is The Gary himself, who has dismissed existing city neighborhoods as places devoid of lawns and churches, and suitable only for bulldozing and replacing with discount big box stores.

It has already been established that temperamentally, CM Price lies much closer to the “evil government” school of the GOP’s Grover Norquist than to the core ideals of his own Democratic affiliation, an identification that looks increasingly opportunistic placed within the relevant context of New Albany’s traditional Democrat-heavy political apparatus.

Accordingly, when asked to state a “clear preference” for the needs of the people of his own 3rd District – needs previously referred to by the councilman as his motivating factor in public service – and to contrast the benefit of inner city redevelopment with the exurban sprawl perpetuated by The Gary and his peers, CM Price can do no better than point to his heartfelt support of good communications between existing neighborhood associations and city government as evidence of his preference.

Like any good politician, CM Price also provides the example of his intervention in a dispute over a used car lot as proof of his involvement in neighborhood advocacy.

Neither does CM Price comment on his lack of engagement in similar issues, nor does he attempt to answer the question asked of him, i.e., to explain the merits of redevelopment of existing neighborhoods vs. sprawl.

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7. Have you or do you intend to approach county officials to develop, in partnership, a countywide plan for smart and coordinated growth?

As I mentioned above, new urbanism or progressive urban planning is a team effort. It would be pointless to try and conceive a plan of progress in New Albany without consulting and coordinating with those who it will have the impact on.

If it will benefit my constituents and city government as a whole, I am certainly not opposed to opening a dialogue with county government regarding a mutually beneficial relationship to further “Smart Growth”, as it can only help.

CM Price’s answer to this question might be summarized as “I’m for it, unless I’m against it,” but he at least manages to indicate allegiance to the vague principle of city-county cooperation, albeit at the cost of avoiding the advocacy of potentially harmful specifics.

Incidentally, as the councilman is eager to imply support for the “smart growth” referred to in the question, here’s an introduction to what the term means: Smart Growth Online.

In communities across the nation, there is a growing concern that current development patterns -- dominated by what some call "sprawl" -- are no longer in the long-term interest of our cities, existing suburbs, small towns, rural communities, or wilderness areas. Though supportive of growth, communities are questioning the economic costs of abandoning infrastructure in the city, only to rebuild it further out. Spurring the smart growth movement are demographic shifts, a strong environmental ethic, increased fiscal concerns, and more nuanced views of growth. The result is both a new demand and a new opportunity for smart growth.

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8. What have you advocated for or will you advocate for that would provide an incentive to or lessen the risk for the early redevelopment "pioneers" who are now making themselves known around the city? Have you played a role in attracting these people and/or how do you hope to empower and encourage them and other similar people?

If the mission of the “early redevelopment ‘pioneers’” is to continue to bring New Albany into the 21st century with a solid fiscal foundation then I will do everything in my power to support them.

If there is a more egregious example of CM Price entirely ignoring the intent of a question, you’ll not find it in the text of this interview.

What would the councilman do to “advocate,” to “attract,” to “encourage,” and to “empower” those willing to invest time and money into redevelopment projects?

Crickets chirp. Pins drop. Somewhere, a dog barks at his shadow.

And Steve Price is completely silent.

Cognitive dissonance is defined as:

A condition of conflict or anxiety resulting from inconsistency between one's beliefs and one's actions, such as opposing the slaughter of animals and eating meat.

Tellingly, CM Price can find nothing positive to say about the efforts of “redevelopment pioneers” because he is fundamentally hostile to their worldview in the social and cultural senses, and though he is grudgingly willing to acknowledge their work – and perhaps cognizant at some level that without their presence, there is little hope of a positive future for New Albany – he can do so only in the vacuous breach.

Given the councilman’s obvious fondness for the “debt-free” household strategies of the right-wing financial guru Dave Ramsey, and noting the breathtakingly transparent manner by which he refuses a tactically proffered opportunity to openly occupy common ground with the “redevelopment pioneers,” it isn’t surprising that he responds with a terse, intentionally lukewarm vote of indifference to the effect that as long as it doesn’t cost him or the city anything, then perhaps he’s for it – or, at best, not actively oppose it.

No single answer provided by CM Price is as indicative of his obstructionist instincts – and his inability to fathom the interests of his constituents -- than this one. Remember it. It’s going to come back again, and again, and again.

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9. What is your reaction to this statement: “And yet, to Steve Price and those of his utterly clueless ilk, Frankfort Avenue is somehow the enemy, an inexplicable collection of strange people and alien concepts to be feared and loathed owing to the incomprehensible differences, and a revitalization equation that simply does not compute -- at least when reckoned by the slumlord’s shopworn abacus.”

This is a classic case of selective listening. Frankfort Avenue is a great example of new urbanism in a land locked area. Currently, New Albany is not land locked. I do believe there is such a thing as over crowding. When you have unimproved land throughout the city why over crowd tight spaces?

Excuse me?

In the sense that tenets of New Urbanism are applicable to New Albany, it is far from clear how being “land-locked” or not has anything to do with them.

Taken from the broader view of city limits and county lines, both New Albany and Floyd County are land-locked, but again, it isn’t clear how this pertains to the application of principles of New Urbanism to the existing neighborhoods and downtown areas of the city.

Overcrowding in the city comes from a block that originally was intended for single family homes but now is filled with these same homes subdivided into three and four unit apartments, and not from building new single family homes on existing vacant lots. While there may be points here that NAC and CM Price are in agreement, it remains that he does not explore them in his answer.

In short, CM Price provides a confusing and perhaps contradictory answer, and he sidesteps the cultural implications that were so obviously implicit in his original reference to Frankfort Avenue as something not to be wished upon New Albany.

See “cognitive dissonance,” above.

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10. In terms of rate of growth in the state of Indiana, Harrison County ranks 4th, Clark County ranks 18th, and Floyd County ranks 44th. A local developer recently expressed to me that the "ridiculous politics" of New Albany played a major role in our low sore. Do you agree with this assessment? Please explain why or why not.

New Albany’s good ol’ boy perception has had an impact over the years. Hopefully our hindsight is becoming increasingly clearer as we pay the debt from our elected elders.

With such a brief and cryptic response, we’re forced to assume that New Albany’s “good ol’ boy perception” is considered by CM Price to be something negative in nature, and as such, we have no problem agreeing with this assessment.

Is it correspondingly clear that with hindsight, we can understand the mistakes of our “elected elders?”

Probably.

Hindsight’s like that … but what, then, of our future as a city? Do we strictly define the future by the the payment of debts in the financial sense, or is there an element of avoiding the past missteps when it comes to planning and strategic direction?

In short, is CM Price an improvement over the malady he diagnoses?

Indirectly, he seems to suggest that there is something to his positioning and political record over the course of two years as councilman to indicate that he is substantively different from these “good ol’ boy” elders that he identifies as those bequeathing disaster to the current generation.

If so, we have not seen the slightest indication of it.

Have you?

Part 3: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price’s interview responses.

(Originally posted in January, 2006)

Part 1: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price's interview responses.
Part 2: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price's interview responses.
Part 3: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price's interview responses.

As a preface to this third and last installment of the series of NA Confidential's examination of interview responses offered by 3rd District Councilman Steve Price, we're happy to report that hits and page views this week are running around 20% more than normal for the days on which the installments ran.

We know you're reading. Thank you.

Part 1: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price’s interview responses.

Part 2: NA Confidential examines Councilman Steve Price’s interview responses.

Our original questions are numbered, and CM Price's original responses italicized. Commentary follows. Note that while two-thirds of the questions asked of CM Price were formulated by Jeff "Bluegill" Gillenwater, the commentary is entirely that of the blog owner. Jeff is invited to join the discussion, either as a team member or in comments, and of course, all readers are likewise encouraged to provide their thoughts subject to our identity policy.

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11. What ideas do you have, if any, to restructure and enhance educational opportunities in New Albany?

As we know from following the news regarding the implementation of the federal “No Child Left Behind” Act we as a municipality are somewhat limited in our ability to legislate public education. However, that does not leave us without options. Other cities are finding ways to increase their school systems services and success. I strongly believe we as a city government owe it to our children to research and investigate plans from other cities to see if they are feasible for New Albany.

Fair enough; if, as it is obvious by the lack of a direct response, CM Price has no immediate ideas of his own, looking to the experience of other cities isn’t without merit. In fact, seeking information in such a manner is a large part of any educational experience.

But is the councilman willing to apply this precedent to other areas of inquiry?

We’ve already seen that Louisville’s successful Frankfort Avenue area is regarded by CM Price as “overcrowded,” “landlocked” and unsuitable as a goal for New Albany.

Can he provide an example of another school system worth studying, one that fits his obviously narrow crieria, i.e., as long as it doesn’t cost the city anything, it’s potentially useful?

More importantly, what else besides educational opportunities do we owe to our children?

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12. What is your plan for giving more meaningful authority to the historic preservation commission and ordinance enforcement position? Do you support the expansion of the city attorney position to full-time and/or the creation of a city court to better deal with the violations cited by those entities? If not, how do you envision the city being able to deal with them adequately?

The City Council established a position of ordinance enforcement officer to enforce the existing ordinances. While doing so, we outlined the consequences of violations to these ordinances. When properly enforced, I feel the message will get out that the city will not tolerate housing in substandard conditions. The City Council has discussed the possibility of a full time attorney. While I am not opposed to the idea, obtaining an accurate account of monies is a more immediate need at the present time.

On Thursday, January 26, the East Spring Street Neighborhood Association had its monthly meeting (as is his habit, CM Price did not attend this meeting).

One local couple went into great detail in describing their renewed efforts to demand accountability for a prominently ramshackle adjoining property. Indeed, after some years of effort, there is cautious optimism that meaningful action finally has been initiated to resolve the rampant code violations and filthy living conditions found in the house by the ordinance enforcement officer, the building commissioner and other officials charged with tending to such matters.

Our point in recounting this episode is that the ensuing discussion, one laced with understandable frustration and pointing of fingers, yet again pointed to certain realities as contributing to – in some ways, of enabling -- the culture of unaccountability that must be reversed if the city of New Albany is to move into the future.

While not excusing indolence on the part of city officials, it remains that in the absence of a city court, and without a full-time city attorney, the chances of successfully following up on building code violations is minimal. The same applies to parking fines.

Furthermore, in the absence of a division of city government responsible for regulating and inspecting rental properties, there are equally limited opportunities to bring the slumlord to heel, and it is the slumlord’s rental properties that are the prime source of “substandard housing.”

In essence, we are asking public officials to do 100% of the job with 50% (or less) of the tools needed, and when asked whether he is in favor of providing the tools – in the end, providing citizens with the tools to take back their neighborhoods – CM Price can offer only a lukewarm acceptance in principle, with the disclaimer that we’ll almost certainly not be able to afford it.

Can we afford not to?

Characteristically, he does not attempt an answer.

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13. As an extension of the preceding, do you agree that New Albany should institute rental property inspections with real teeth? Why or why not?

As a reminder, I spearheaded the cleanliness ordinance. I think homeowners’ period should take responsibility for their property. At the present time, I feel we need to focus on enforcing the established ordinances before entertaining new ones.

See the analysis of #12, preceding.

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14. Is there a difference between being a “taxpayer watchdog” and expressing public contempt for the ideals of civic progress? Please explain.

The difference is the “taxpayer watchdog” is open-minded and looking out for the better good of the community and supports “community-based “ progress and takes a stand on force fed growth. A “taxpayer watchdog” knows taking out a 2nd mortgage to go to Disney World isn’t the smartest business move you can make. While the latter would say no without just reason, the “taxpayer watchdog” says lets look at ways to make the progress happen without tax increases. We can progress ourselves into bankruptcy. After all, Grandma’s don’t spend it if you don’t have it philosophy left wealth not debt with her memory. Let history be our teacher.

CM Price closes the NA Confidential interview on a palpable note of impatience, defiantly welding together a handful of favored themes and convenient catchphrases into a rousing homily designed to rally his constituency to his defense.

Stripping away the tired rhetoric (second mortgages to finance a vacation, “progress” into bankruptcy) and unsupported premises (force-fed growth, “better good” of the community), we’re left with the fundamental premise – one that CM Price has articulated throughout his term in office – that government finance is the same thing as household finance, and by extension, that if Dave Ramsey can instruct Steve Price how to keep his family debt free, that should be good enough for the city of New Albany as a whole.

It should be noted that NA Confidential does not deny the efficacy of the “taxpayer watchdog,” for we, too, pay taxes like all the rest.

Rather, we believe that by the very nature of the social contract (as implicitly recognized by CM Price, though perhaps not by our Libertarian friends and readers), government is entrusted with performing a number of tasks the likes of which are not directly applicable to household or business finance.

These tasks pertain to the commonweal, or the public good. Police and fire protection are among them, although they’re not the only examples.

Money in this context is a means to an end. Yes, it must be accounted for, properly audited and explained to the citizenry. Yes, we are certain that it does not grow on trees. But there are indeed matters of importance to the community in general, and insofar as these are the domain of elected officials and their appointees, they must sometimes be considered in ways that differ from the calculations made by those living from paycheck to paycheck.

If these considerations and expenditures are botched and the monies misused, legal and electoral ramifications will come into effect.

Government has never been as simple as grandma’s cookie jar philosophy, and it never will be, but there will always be those among us who seek to simplify the world in such a way, and who do so from both noble and ignoble motivations, but sometimes for other reasons, too.

Perhaps grandma was frightened, unwilling to confront the uncertainties of a changing world, content with her lot in life but unaware of the possibilities. With some encouragement and information, she might have seen that sometimes one spends money to make money – as in the case of her grandchildren borrowing to attend college.

Maybe then, instead of fearing the future, she would have embraced it. Rather than be intimidated by the inevitable force of change, she would have seen in it the seeds of diversity that carry within them the potential for community-wide empowerment, achievement, success.

Throughout the NA Confidential interview, Councilman Steve Price clearly enunciates a tri-partite “vision” about the city of New Albany and its future.

We don’t comprehend the future.

We can’t afford the future.

We can’t.

When one considers CM Price ’s policy alternatives, it becomes clear that he, along with fellow Councilman Dan Coffey, speaks as the foremost local prophet of decay management as the only attainable goal.

This is completely unacceptable to the majority of CM Price's constituents.

NA Confidential is dedicated to a differing proposition.

“We Can.”

You, our readers and citizens, are invited to join us.

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15. Neil Young or Bob Dylan?

What do you think?

We think neither. The Manic Street Preachers came close with "If you tolerate this/Then your children will be next," but they come from a place (Wales) where they don't even speak English all the time.

Although we may not enjoy the music, the only artist that matters is the one embraced by the young New Albanians still in school, because that artist will provide the soundtrack for their future.

We're working toward their future being here, in New Albany.