VIDEO: 3rd District Council Q&A

The East Spring Street Neighborhood Association hosted a question and answer session for 3rd district City Council candidates on October 10. Steve Price is the Democratic incumbent. Brenda Scharlow is the Republican challenger. ESNA President Greg Phipps moderated with a few pre-submitted questions taken from earlier meetings with mayoral candidates. The rest of the questions and conversation were directed by attendees.

The full session lasted a little over an hour. It's presented here in nine segments of six to ten minutes each, arranged from top to bottom in chronological order so that each segment flows into the next. One question was missed, as noted in the respective segment.

Barbecued bologna is healthier, spluttered the Wizard of Westside.

A poster at the Louisville Hot Bytes restaurant forum passed this along:

My best bud and I played music and sang a wedding in New Albany. Upon leaving, I told her I was dying to try this restaurant. Nobody at the Methodist church had ever heard of it. The church secretary brought out 2 yellow pages books and could not find the address! Finally, we drove to a convenient store on State Street where I asked everyone there about it. Finally, one lady said she thought she had seen the sign, blah blah so we followed Market St until....voila!! At this point, I think even my best friend thought I was crazy!

Oh my goodness....the food was just amazing! I had the veggie enchiladas with green sauce. My friend had a shrimp quesadilla. You sure can tell the difference in homemade, everything from scratch ingredients. Our server was a friendly young lady who did a superb job. Water was always refilled, questions answered, etc. We were both SO impressed with the food, atmosphere and service! I will be back VERY soon. I just want to know why all the "New Albanians" have never heard of this place!!! VERY strange.

Certainly no one denies that New Albanians are, well, a bit behind the times, and occasionally even misinformed. How else do we account for the Gang of Four?

As we await the advent of a barbecued bologna quesadilla, here's an impromptu Top Ten list of why New Albanians don't know La Rosita's exists:

10. Many New Albanians have yet to concede that there is a Hispanic presence in the community.

9. Many of those who have noticed Hispanics are intimidated by them and persist in patronizing Taco Bell, since it’s advertised on television and as a result clearly must be the best choice.

8. Chef Israel got tired of hearing New Albanians ask for “enchilada style,” so now he refers all of them to whatever is left of Tumbleweed … and they actually go.

7. The people who work in mini-marts all commute from outlying areas, flee after dark, and consequently know even less than the natives about New Albany’s life and times.

6. New Albanians have been so busy removing the mufflers from their motorcycles that they didn’t notice all the cars lined up outside 1515 East Market Street.

5. Who needs authentic Mexican food when the chicken and dumplings at Harvest Homecoming are so good AND so cheap?

4. Cultural diversity is outlawed by city council ordinance, although residents are still required to maintain a parlor spittoon and keep a spare horseshoe in their buggies.

3. La Rosita’s has beer but not liquor, hence no dollar margarita night during the NASCAR race, as at Los Indios.

2. What? No burgers? How do you expect my wholesome, angelic child to eat in a place without burgers? Whaddya think this is, Tijuana? Big Buford, here we come.

1. The Yellow Pages remain useless if you were never taught to alphabetize, and besides, there are various religious injunctions against coveting your neighbor’s cilantro.

Scene from the latest New Albanian Art Show.

That's Tony Beard, graphic artist, who works for NABC designing label art and hoisting kegs in the brewery.

And that's all you're getting out of me today. I'll be outdoors.

Surprise: Mayoral "forum" on tap for Wednesday, October 24 at the library.

NAC graciously permitted the Tribune the scoop on this one.

Don’t call it a debate in New Albany mayor’s race, by Eric Scott Campbell.

Mayoral candidates Randy Hubbard and Doug England have not appeared on the same stage yet in this campaign, a distinction that will continue even after a forum featuring both of them next week.

Some weeks back, Develop New Albany’s economic restructuring committee discussed the possibility of arranging a mayoral candidate forum for the express purpose of focusing the candidates' attention on downtown revitalization issues.

Democratic candidate Doug England’s camp immediately and enthusiastically signaled acceptance, but Republican candidate Randy Hubbard subsequently let it be known that he would accede to no such gatherings, citing scheduling conflicts and conceding indirectly to a general absence of political acumen.

Fortunately, Develop New Albany board member Ed Clere didn’t let it rest there, and now a compromise of sorts has been reached.

We are pleased to announce that Develop New Albany will sponsor a mayoral candidate forum at 7:00 p.m. on Wednesday, October 24, in the Strassweg Auditorium of the New Albany-Floyd County Public Library. Each candidate will have 45 minutes to answer prepared questions presented by a moderator. Republican Randy Hubbard will appear first, followed by a 15-minute break and then Democrat Doug England. Questions will focus on downtown growth and revitalization issues.

In spite of the fact that there will be no questions allowed from the public, NAC nonetheless asks readers to submit questions and topics for this forum. We'll listen carefully to see if these are answered, albeit indirectly, and perhaps submit them for follow-up answers to the candidates' handlers.

For more thoughts on the forthcoming election, visit NA Shadow Council.

This weekend: "New Albany to welcome Hoagy Carmichael for one final tour."

A press release from the Carnegie Center. Note also that hops and art both are available in abundance at NABC this weekend; more information can be found here: Publicanista! Lupulin Land Harvest Hopcoming and New Albanian Art Show edition.

A life-size bronze statue of Hoagy Carmichael at his Steinway Grand Piano will be visiting downtown New Albany, Indiana October 19-20, 2007 at the Speakeasy Jazz Club, 225 State Street, and Indiana University Southeast October 22-25. This visit is part of a statewide tour to re-engage Hoosiers’ knowledge of this creative composer and his enormous contributions to the landscape of American music. At the conclusion of the tour this fall, the statue will be dedicated and permanently installed at Indiana University in Bloomington, where Hoagy was born and received a law degree.

Accompanying the sculpture will be a display chronicling Carmichael’s life, kiosks, archives, and various items promoting his life and career. The sculptor/designer, Michael McAuley will also be on site to answer questions and present a lecture concerning the sculpture and Carmichael’s life.

He was one of America’s great songsmiths and the very first of the American singer-songwriters. Although playing piano from an early age, his passion for music truly ignited at the beginning of the America Jazz movement. He composed numerous songs, including Stardust and Georgia on My Mind – two of the most recorded songs in the history of music. In 1951 he won an Oscar for his song In the Cool, Cool, Cool of the Evening. Later, Hoagy was given his own television show and gained 14 film credits with actors such as Kirk Douglas and Humphrey Bogart, among others. He was one of the first 10 songwriters inducted into the nation’s Songwriters Hall of Fame.

Sponsored by Caesars Foundation of Floyd County, local organizers of this Hoagy Tribute Tour include the Carnegie Center for Art & History, the Floyd County Historical Society, Develop New Albany, and the IU Alumni Association.

For more information, contact the Carnegie Center at 812-944-7336 or visit http://www.carnegiecenter.org/.

City Council rained/stormed out.

According to NAC's good friend Lloyd, last evening's council meeting was adjourned owing to inclement weather, with all council members and unfortunate citizens present being taken into the City-County Building's basement for an impromptu lecture by the Wizard of Westside: "Bazooka Joe academic degrees I have conjured -- and why you must listen to me describe them."

Prior to Dan Coffey's recitation of "Gitmo on the Ohio," an actual work session was held so that the Gang of Four could say all the same discredited things as last time, to no apparent effect, and with little hope that a redistricting trial can be avoided.

As W. C. Fields once observed, "I'd rather be in Philadelphia."

How 'bout them storm water appointments ...

... and all it will take for us to reach them is Dan Coffey pontificating about his vast knowledge of drainage and aquatic engineering.

I’ve had merrier times at funerals than yesterday morning, when I dropped in on Dave Clancy at the now defunct Bistro New Albany for a chat about his life and times. BNA is history, and if we’re all lucky, Dave will pack his pots, pan and remaining staff for a short hike to the Speakeasy so that two birds are magically felled with one stone, and in the meantime, at-large city council candidate John Gonder contributed these wise words:

Yes, this is a blow. More than that it is a sad occasion for Dave himself. He certainly deserves praise for his effort and the quality of what he brought to New Albany, not only in dining but in hope.

It is not going to stop the revitalization of the downtown; that train has left the station. It is inevitable that restaurants will flower and falter. I'm certain someone is already looking at the Bistro's space. Whoever sets up there will be part of a more vital downtown scene thanks to Dave's work.

I wish Dave the best and hope he takes the needed time to recharge his battery.

True, all true. That’s why the Gonder sign graces the front yard of the NAC compound.

Life goes on, and there’ll be a city council meeting tonight. Although I plan on attending, there isn’t much of interest on the agenda unless the Gang of Four attempts some of the obstructionist voodoo that it does so well.

Dan "Wizard of Westside" Coffey would appear to have temporarily shelved his “cripple economic development for the foreseeable future” ordinance; presumably, he awaits tribute, palm-greasing or whatever form of ego-stroking is necessary for him to come down from the ledge and make nice. Just out of curiosity, does anyone know whether the mayor can veto it if necessary?

Also, the much anticipated first reading of a redistricting ordinance appears on the evening’s agenda, as assigned to be introduced by 3rd district councilman Steve Price, who recently told us that it was “Larry’s thing” and something Price hasn’t yet really bothered to research, and in reaction to this, I can do nothing whatsoever to suppress a massive yawn.

This naturally implies that a blissfully thought-free Price will maintain lock/goose step with the frothing Coffeyites and vote in favor of the “Schmidt Plan,” something ostensibly written by councilman Bill Schmidt, but actually written by his wife, which means that even though council president Larry Kochert continues to insist that no outsiders be allowed to contribute to council business that he was content for the council to ignore for five years until challenged at the point of an edict, an outsider’s plan will be the one that is approved, and then struck down by a judge when the case goes to trial, which it almost certainly now will, primarily because “good faith” and “Larry Kochert” have as much in common as “race relations” and “Ku Klux Klan.”

But you see, all that doesn’t matter much to me. There’s been a death in the family, and right now, I’m wearing black and drinking tall IPAs out of a short glass.

There'll be more setbacks, but very soon, the clueless vandals will no longer enjoy a council majority, and the quavering indecisiveness of the Gang's resident swing voter will be no more.

John Gonder is right: “That train has left the station,” and although it will be leaving garbage to pick up, that’s what private contractors are for, aren’t they?

R.I.P.: Bistro New Albany.

You have to understand how hard this is for me.

I kept it to myself until the news came from Dave Clancy himself, and here it is, as posted on the Louisville Hot Bytes restaurant forum:

It is with a heavy heart that I have chosen to shut the doors of my labor of love. Due to circumstances beyond my control (mostly financial), my restaurant is closed as of 10/16/07. This was not an easy choice for me as I was so close to success that it is going to break my heart to see it end like this. I have run this place alone for well over a year and it has truly ruined me in every sense and, given the choice, I would do it all over again (only next time, I'll have a little more cash!). Thank you all for your support over the course of the last few years and wish me luck as I try to sort out a dead business and find some new direction to travel. If anyone is looking for an old washed up Chef, let me know!-Dave

It's remarkably easy for people who can do no better than "start up" the occasional rag picker's business or do contracting work without permits to understand how difficult a genuine paradigm shift is to achieve. All of downtown New Albany currently is engaged in that paradign shift, and it's a work in progress that unfortunately will have its ups and downs. Bistro New Albany's demise is a downer, but within it are seeds of positive developments.

What I know is this: Dave Clancy chose to stick it out as a pioneer in a place where the naysayers said it couldn't be done; what's more, he chose to stick it out when he wasn't ever supposed to be the sole owner of the business (recall that the original investor dropped out, and that former partner Dave Himmel moved on to his own business), and not once did he curse his bad fortune. Rather, he saw the potential and put his scant resources on the table.

He lost the bet. Dave might not be the best poker player, but he has considerable balls, and he'll always be a hero to me.

Meanwhile, don't expect the BNA space to be vacant for long. The Green Mouse says that wheels are spinning as we mourn, and that while a replacement for the undercapitalized Bistro New Albany probably won't be remotely of the same genre, ground indeed was broken, and there are too many good things about the BNA experience for savvy operators to ignore.

Perhaps another downtown eatery in need of a boost might be in need of a chef ...

Harvest Homecoming's "swill walk" emblematic of clashing demographics.

Previously published at the Potable Curmudgeon blog. By the way, my company is not planning on moving downtown. We're planning on expanding into downtown. Somehow this was garbled after the recent newspaper article, but rest assured that we've no intention of changing the current operation.

---

New Albany’s annual Harvest Homecoming festival started life quite small and inconspicuously four decades ago, and it has since grown into what its organizers claim is the second largest gathering of its type in the state of Indiana, trailing only the Indianapolis 500 celebration.

There are numerous themed events for two weeks preceding the yearly parade, then four “booth days” during which streets in the heart of New Albany’s historic business district are closed, yielding to want amounts to an enormous food court with games, information and music thrown in for good measure. At its best, the ideal of Harvest Homecoming is civic-minded and predominantly local in nature, with generations frequenting the same rolled oyster booth or chicken dinner emporium run by the same church or charity.

When Harvest Homecoming took its embryonic shape in the late 1960’s, and unbeknownst to most people living at the time, New Albany’s downtown was about to commence a long, painful and degrading descent into dormancy. As my ruminations today are not intended to constitute an essay about the familiar phenomenon of inner-city urban decay, I’ll leave it at that, and observe that Harvest Homecoming’s governing committee might plausibly say that for a long period of time, certainly by the 1990’s, the festival’s four-day, early October run was about the only game going downtown.

Consequently, Harvest Homecoming has been planned accordingly. Now, with stirrings of downtown revitalization far too strong to be ignored, the plan likely will have to be modified in coming years. Unfortunately, a case can be made that Harvest Homecoming’s demographic and the demographic spearheading downtown revitalization are heading in opposite directions, with potential difficulties that might as well be addressed now rather than later.

For those who have glimpsed a bit of the planet outside New Albany, and who have had the good fortune to be exposed to post-secondary education and its expansion of consciousness, there almost inevitably exists a measure of ambivalence about Harvest Homecoming as the institution has evolved – some would say “devolved – over the years. This ambivalence does not imply rejection of it, but simply a recognition that sometimes the closer one is to something, the harder it is to see how it really looks.

The festival’s stewards are “lifer” volunteers who work hard year-round, and while any fair critique of their performance might point to a deeply ingrained conservatism and a general reluctance to think outside the Bud, their fundamental aim of maintaining a family-oriented annual celebration is admirable.

Admirable, yes, but certainly not easy to ensure, and no single Harvest Homecoming “event” grandly compromises the committee’s goal of a family friendly festival like the Friday afternoon “beer walk,” which might be termed the “swill walk,” and so I think I will.

From the outset, make no mistake: The official Harvest Homecoming committee is no friend of the swill walk, and bristles when people contact the organizers for information about it. Although in the past, I merely shrugged and considered the committee’s attitude toward the swill walk to be an extension of its customary stodginess on other matters, this year I made it a point to observe the swill walk in progress.

The committee is right on target. It isn’t a pretty picture. In fact, the swill walk is a civic embarrassment, and as part and parcel of a litigious society, it’s probably only a matter of time before something ugly occurs and the torts begin flying. Speaking personally, at a time when many in my sector of the beer business are trying to raise the bar when it comes to responsible beer consumption, the swill walk sadly reminds us that neo-Prohibitionists occasionally have something approximating a valid point, and that the activities of the nation’s mass-market swill merchants are as much of a daily threat to our ability to offer the populace a changed paradigm as those who would eliminate alcohol entirely on grounds of its intrinsic “evil.”

Like many other aspects of life, there surely are evils intrinsic to the consumption of beer. Most of us are devoted to the ideal of lessening these, so why encourage their exaltation?

The way it works is this. Every year on the Friday afternoon of Harvest Homecoming, a style show is held at the riverfront “beer tent” (“swill tent” is more like it) during lunchtime, and the show’s conclusion is the unofficial signal for hundreds of people to begin, or in many cases to continue, drinking while traversing a jagged route through the blocked-off and humanity-packed downtown streets where food and activity booths hold sway.

The ubiquity of gratis Anheuser-Busch advertising paraphernalia, which is generated in-house at the local wholesaler at a scale that would humble the propagandistic Communist and Fascist regimes of old, provides ample evidence as to the underlying grease that lubricates the phenomenon of the swill walk, namely, that the local A-B wholesaler has agreed not to cash the checks written to pay for two-story stacks of Bud Light until the week following the festival’s conclusion, something that is of borderline legality in the state of Indiana.

Meanwhile, duly oiled, the denizens of the swill walk surge through the most congested harvest Homecoming area, participants stumbling from one bar to the next, slamming liquor shots and chugging beer from cans that are seldom recycled while screaming obscenities in proximity to children, then urinating in places that even someone like me – a veteran of Oktoberfest in Munich and Pamplona’s festival of San Fermin – is hard pressed to imagine.

Once I saw a port-a-can being nearly toppled by drunks. Around the corner, bikers clad in ominous black costumes queued a short block away from where this year’s “teen scene” stage was erected. How Pamplona manages to achieve a balance between its children and an invading wave of Euro trash is beyond me; perhaps we might ask, because the New Albany way doesn’t seem to be working.

The family-unfriendly effect of all this is hard to exaggerate in print, and when taken in the context of an overall festival that sadly has devolved over the decades into low, lower and lowest common denominators – a metaphor applicable to the city as a whole – it’s frustrating, indeed, to witness the chaos and know that I’m in the same business.

I’m neither naïve, nor out to bring the furies crashing down on the urine-stained drunks gracefully bellowing at each other during the swill walk. It is not my intention to frown on the profit motives of downtown bar owners, who probably reap several weeks of revenue in three days during Harvest Homecoming, and who are happy to accept largesse as offered by wholesalers eager to see the cash registers hum.

Of course, I well understand that my “good beer” segment of the marketplace is small, but I also maintain that this niche is upwardly mobile and in keeping with humanity’s constructive (as opposed to anarchic) instincts, and furthermore, that it is capable of sense and sensibility in addition to windfall weekend profits.

If NABC’s projected downtown brewing project comes to fruition, I hope to be able to illustrate that beer quality can be good, not bland, and that better beer can be consumed responsibly in a wholesome, entertaining and better atmosphere – which, after all, is the lesson any thinking human being takes away after sitting for a couple of hours drinking beer in a Bavarian beer garden, with playground equipment and young children generally in close proximity. Our future beer sales during Harvest Homecoming will be contained and controlled as far as humanly possible, and we’ll try to offer a higher common denominator. We may fail, but we’ll try.

Disclaimers aside, and in spite of my reluctance to tempt unfavorable karma by saying it aloud, the swill walk that takes place during Harvest Homecoming is aided and abetted by a blind eye to illegality, and while I can understand this coming from the local gendarmes, I find it curious that the state tolerates it.

You’re free to disagree. On this call, I suspect many of you will.

Harvest Homecoming scene at Bistro New Albany.

Rep. Baron Hill (D-9th) greets members of his fan club at Bistro New Albany last Friday afternoon. Note the stylish "Pin the Tail on George W." game in the background.

Tribune: "STEWART, CANDIDATE FOR NEW ALBANY CITY COUNCIL, DIES."

11:10 a.m. update: A reliable source has just reported that restaurateur Sam Anderson, who lost to Dick Stewart by a razor-thin margin in the May primary, has just left the clerk's office in the company of Floyd County GOP chairman David Matthews. It is surmised that Anderson will be the new Republican candidate for the 6th district seat currently occupied by Jeff Gahan (D). Verification, anyone?

Sunday’s Tribune reported the death of Dick Stewart, local gadfly and the Republican candidate for the 6th district council seat.

STEWART, CANDIDATE FOR NEW ALBANY CITY COUNCIL, DIES.

The "Fiscal Conservative" pays tribute: In Memory of Richard "Dick" Stewart.

Speaking personally, I admired Dick’s verve even if it was consistently directed toward the wrong target, and NAC actually praised him for his council campaign platform plank of a “revolving home-ownership program for first-time buyers as a means to reduce rentals.”

Our condolences are extended to Dick’s family and friends.

Tonight: Indiana Commission on Local Government Reform at IUS.

I've been asked to post this announcement:

Tonight (Monday, October 15), the Indiana Commission on Local Government Reform is on the road, and coming to Indiana University Southeast.

October 15
Indiana University Southeast, New Albany
University Center North
Hoosier Room East

New hope for the riverfront: Thousands gather downtown to toast Trinkle’s departure.

Okay, perhaps they were in streaming through the streets for Harvest Homecoming, but a boy can dream, right?

33 years ago, Richard M. Nixon recorded his greatest achievement in a lifetime of public service by leaving the White House in disgrace.

In October, 1994, the Peter Principle was turned upside down when Eddie Laduke received his pink slip and was dismissed from the editor’s chair of the New Albany Tribune.

Someday, sooner or later, councilman Dan Coffey will no longer hold an elected office in the city of New Albany, and his neighborhood can finally emerge from captivity and turn its calendar pages forward.

Meanwhile, all the imagery this weekend is joyful:

New Albany City Wrap: Riverfront Director Bob Trinkle resigning, by Eric Scott Campbell (News and Tribune).

Bob Trinkle, director of riverfront programming under Mayor James Garner, announced Thursday that he’ll step down Dec. 31, the end of Garner’s term.

Trinkle told mayoral candidates Doug England and Randy Hubbard about his plans to resign, “and both of them concur,” Trinkle said in a media statement. He told the candidates he is willing to help in a transitional capacity or to return to the part-time post.

On the campaign trail, England and Hubbard have expressed the desire to improve and expand the use of the Riverfront Amphitheatre.

For the remainder of the year, Trinkle will plan next year’s spring and summer events. He thanked Garner for his “unqualified support within the constraints of a city budget with many priorities.”

Trinkle who couldn’t find his way out of the conventional thinking box with a Saturn rocket bungeed to his back side, was undoubtedly James Garner’s single worst appointment as mayor.

Throughout his career, Trinkle has gazed in fear upon multi-generational diversity and artistic creativity and always -- always -- he has seen only encroachments and dire threats to the suffocating limitations of his own preferred monocultural milieu. Never has it occurred to him that these offer virtually limitless possibilities for circumventing the “constraints of a city budget with many priorities," which he now predictably cites as an excuse upon exiting the scene.

Trinkle's tenure on the waterfront was a pathetic failure. Perhaps, for once, the city will learn something from the experience. I, for one, am learning not to hold my breath.

Previously at NAC:

On the merits of Boblessness: Inject entrepreneurialism into New Albany’s Riverfront Amphitheater, and restore value to a mismanaged community asset.

On the waterfront: Same old song and dance .

Not spectacular enough? Maybe they should play some Zappa, instead.

If he's not going to use the Riverfront Amphitheater, would Bullet Bob mind if we borrowed it and made some money?

Tribune guest columnist considers Harvest Homecoming's downtown context.

With celebratory detritus strewn amid downtown’s food booths and porta-potties, and a final afternoon of rolled oysters still to come, today’s Tribune guest columnist offers a balanced analysis of Harvest Homecoming, pro and con:

ROBISON: Looking past the booths of Harvest, by Daniel Robison, Local Columnist.

Harvest Homecoming: it was the best of times, it was the worst of times. New Albany puts on a good face for a weekend or two — and what a nice face it is — but the festival tends to gloss over some of the city’s bigger issues. It’s our city’s shining moment, when the rust is hidden by banners and booths so a good impression can be made on all that visit our city one time a year …

… But while thousands from the area descend on downtown New Albany, the location of the event could hardly be any less relevant to most attendees. Sure, Harvest Homecoming is in downtown New Albany, but it’s not of downtown New Albany. People stay in the streets, booths cover the businesses — little attention is paid to the locale. Since Harvest Homecoming fails to effectively tie-in to New Albany’s struggling downtown, why even hold it there at all? Tradition, sure. But the parking is better elsewhere ...

Coincidentally, NAC referenced several of these points in Friday’s posting:

Whither Harvest Homecoming?

Harvest Homecoming is deeply conservative institution, but the downtown cityscape is changing, and there will inevitably come a time when the festival is called upon to change with it.

Previously, we've discussed possible strategies for "alternative" Harvest Homecoming events to take place near downtown during the same time. These might involve more, shall we say, "contemporary" food, drink and entertainment options, with perhaps an element of social and political advocacy that reflects a broader plane than that currently espoused. Any such effort would have to come entirely from ourselves, because as guardians of New Albany's chosen "signature" annual event, Harvest Homecoming's organizers well understand the considerable resources the festival commands, and aren't likely to cede these any voluntarily time soon. That's why I persist in thinking that off-campus, privately inspired options are the best path; if these succeed, the pressure on Harvest Homecoming to reinvent itself will be irresistible.

There’ll be more to say about all this elsewhere, and conversations with Harvest Homecoming’s organizing committee probably will be commencing soon. With an election approaching, it should be obvious that any dialogue about such matters must include politicians, so in closing, here’s another piece of wisdom from Robison’s column:

And while the candidates glad hand and act like your best friend while struggling to remember your name, pressure them to talk about what surrounds them. Just because the façade of Harvest Homecoming hides most downtown doesn’t mean its not there. Let them know that.

Amen to that.

"Five takes a look at Three."

A new blogger on the block:

Five takes a look at Three ... from the NA Shadow Council blog.

It's not my job to "shadow" events in District 3, but I can't quite resist commenting on what I've heard coming out of the "major" party campaigns going on over there.

Though I couldn't make it, friends reported some of the comments made by the candidates at the Muir Manor candidate's forum, moderated by Greg Phipps. From what I am told, all but a handful of the attendees were members of the East Spring Street Neighborhood Association. (what's going on with their acronym, ESNA? Doesn't the name dictate 2 esses?)

Mr. Price showed something by just appearing. The Spring Streeters are almost uniformly fed up with Steve Price. It would be hard to characterize that group as either Democrat or Republican, but for the most part they are progressive in the best sense. They believe in a government that is responsive to its constituents, and they believe that government SHOULD be a vehicle for accomplishing community-shared objectives.

Whither Harvest Homecoming?

Don't forget where to drink good beer during Harvest Homecoming.

Meanwhile, the best way to meet your trognonymous critics is head on and full speed:

It feels just like 1967 all over the place... from the Letter from New Albany blog.

Driving past this morning, detouring around the over-night tent city that downtown has become, I was amused by the plastic neon "fencing" surrounding every possible living inch of Monroe Shine. I know nothing gives them more anal-compulsive fits than hordes of swill-drinking red-necks from the lower tax brackets putting out hundreds of cheap cigarettes in their shrubberies.

Lately, I've made my peace with Harvest Homecoming, but the debate resurfaces with regularity, and one thing you can count on is that in coming years, there'll be an emerging dialogue as to the way Harvest Homecoming plays out each year. Harvest Homecoming is deeply conservative institution, but the downtown cityscape is changing, and there will inevitably come a time when the festival is called upon to change with it.

Previously, we've discussed possible strategies for "alternative" Harvest Homecoming events to take place near downtown during the same time. These might involve more, shall we say, "contemporary" food, drink and entertainment options, with perhaps an element of social and political advocacy that reflects a broader plane than that currently espoused. Any such effort would have to come entirely from ourselves, because as guardians of New Albany's chosen "signature" annual event, Harvest Homecoming's organizers well understand the resources the festival commands, and aren't likely to cede these any voluntarily time soon. That's why I persist in thinking that off-campus, privately inspired options are the best path; if these succeed, the pressure on Harvest Homecoming to reinvent itself will be irresistible.

I wrote these words a couple years ago:

Ideas we surely have, and in abundance, but money and volunteer labor are two commodities in much, much shorter supply. Currently these are directed toward Harvest Homecoming, which possesses its own internal and self-perpetuating set of rationales and objectives. For what it is, it’s a wonderful thing.

But as my councilman might say, "it is what it is."

For once, he'd be right.

As currently configured, I accept Harvest Homecoming as it is, while at the same time seeing what it might become, and envisioning ways to aid and abet its evolution -- particularly once NABC is doing business downtown.

Until then, there's good beer alongside the swill at Connor's Place ... and choice always is a good thing.

Where to drink good beer during Harvest Homecoming.

Speaking personally, it has been a cherished goal to live long enough that I might be able to enjoy a craft beer downtown during New Albany’s annual Harvest Homecoming celebration, and by doing so, to strike a small blow against the hegemony of the swill merchants.

In 2005, the old House of Bread put two kegs of NABC beer on tap during Harvest Homecoming, and last year, its successor, Bistro New Albany expanded the NABC selection while adding craft beers from Upland (a Bloomington, Indiana microbrewery) and others from America and around the world.

BNA will do it again this year, and there’ll be NABC and Upland beers on tap once again. Unlike last year, BNA will conduct food and drink business during booth days both outside on the patio and inside in the dining room, which means that one need not be restricted to elephant ears and rolled oysters (the latter remaining a favorite of mine) from the street side vendors.

Another marvelous option is added for 2007: Connor’s Place, run by former BNA partner Dave Himmel, and located on Main Street adjacent to the Parthenon. CP will feature NABC drafts during Harvest Homecoming: Community Dark, Elector, Flat Tyre, Hoptimus (limited quantities) and Mt. Lee (also limited quantities).

Flat Tyre will be available in cask-conditioned form from the hand pump, which has been borrowed from NABC for the occasion, giving Connor’s the distinction of being the first New Albany establishment during the modern era to offer hand-pumped “real” ale. When the cask version is depleted, there’ll be a regular keg as back-up. Connor’s Place will also have Oktoberfest beers from Upland, Browning’s (Louisville micro) and Spaten (Germany).

I believe that Elector will be on tap at Speakeasy Jazz, NABC’s remaining downtown account.

Yes, swill reigns supreme at Harvest Homecoming, and it probably always will. However, all we ever wanted was a choice. Now more than ever, we have it. If you like good beer and you’re downtown the next three days, visit one of these fine establishments and buy one. In NABC isn’t your taste, my feelings aren’t hurt; have another microbrew or an import instead, and let them know that you appreciate having options. Rest assured that if it were up to Anheuser-Busch, you wouldn’t have any.

I’ll huff and puff and blow …

... insert Glenn Murphy Jr. joke here.

Keep going … that’s right … a bit more, please … yep, all the way down, until we reach the Hoosierpundit’s blog site, where’s he’s having his way with me, and I must confess to being titillated:

New Albany's Mayoral War of Letters Continues

First, let’s take care of some housekeeping. I’d like to publicly thank Brenda Scharlow for the nifty yard sign, and if GOP chairman David Matthews was in any small way responsible, then thanks are due him, too.

Also, the Floyd County Democratic Party chairman’s Tribune response to the Matthews-attacks-England tempest, published yesterday, is instructive and educational. It can be perused here.

In responses to my blog postings offered by Matthews and Scott Fluhr (the Hoosierpundit), necessary attribution is scant when it comes to certain assumptions being made about me, as in the following:

Matthews: “The critic turned self-proclaimed web blog czar.”

Fluhr: “While I can understand this for Roger Baylor--he's just a blogger and likes to self-style himself as a socialist.”

Fluhr: “Self-crowned smear detector Roger Baylor.”

Geez, you’d think they’re trying to make me look bad. Not to belabor the point, but you guys barely know me, and that’s three accusations of self-directed, auto-stimulation hurdling toward me just days apart – and from two different counties, no less.

Granted, someone like me who drinks beer for a living can never rule out anything, but all the same, I’m asking that you provide a bit of documentation.

I can’t seem to recall referring to myself as a “web blog czar” (at any rate, I’d have spelled it “tsar”) or as a “smear detector” (the gynecologists work their side of the street, and I work mine, right?) and about the closest I’ve come to self-identification with socialism would be periodically expressing solidarity with European Social Democrats.

It comes as no surprise, but Fluhr actually dredges out the “C” word and exposes me as a “Communist,” and now I must beat Whittaker Chambers to the pumpkin patch lest my career as a double agent is revealed. Funny, isn’t it, that a fellow who was all of seven years old when I was traveling through Eastern Europe and seeing Communism up close and personal now “deigns” to red wash me. Sorry to disappoint you, but being there didn’t make me want to do it here.

As for the significance of my pub’s Red Room, the Right just doesn’t do irony, does it?

Turning back to New Albany, both Matthews and Fluhr, and probably more than a few others, are taking great delight in uncovering what they regard as inconsistencies in my writings, and as I’ve noted previously, it’s no great feat to thumb through a few hundred thousand words and find statements that don’t match, or be able to prove and disprove virtually anything. It’s an occupational hazard for anyone who writes, and the hazards increase the better one is at it, but make no mistake: I’ve always quite enjoyed being articulate in a dunderhead’s world.

I’ve always found it strange that for some people, seemingly the highest aspiration in life is to first form an opinion, and then to doggedly stick with it from early childhood until dementia and death, all the while remaining oblivious to surroundings that have no constant feature other than perpetual change.

In political terms, both Matthews and Fluhr would have you think that I’ve scandalously flip-flopped, having once doubted the merits of Doug England, and now jumped aboard the ex-mayor’s bandwagon. Really? Seeing that my candidate lost in the primary, what am I to do now, sit out the general election in protest? My publicly stated misgivings have been considered privately by the candidate himself, and if the answers I’ve received are not entirely to my satisfaction, we’re close enough for rock and roll.

Why doesn’t England’s opponent ask these same questions at a public forum? Perhaps he will, yet.

Besides, didn’t the sainted Ronald Reagan switch political parties? Just like Reagan, for whom I hold little affection, I have a core set of principles that motivate me, with varying degrees of success, to face the passing days. Like anyone, I endeavor to stay with the program. Like anyone, I experience success and failure. But with experience, and by trials and error, my core set of principles has evolved, and certainly will continue to do so.

In the end, to me, elections may be zero-sum contests – one person wins, another loses (Al Gore believes there is a third possibility), but politics and ideas are non-zero-sum propositions. All is flux, adaptation, and evolution.

Hoosierpundit’s morbid interest in my level of self-confidence is duly noted. Alas, his own respect for discourse must be flagging, as – yes -- no comments are allowed at his blog.

Have I yawned yet? No? Must be time for a beer.

What Blevins, Coffey, Price, Kochert, and Schmidt rejected in choosing to go to trial

In order to avoid any public confusion, the actual and final consent decree proposed in conjunction by the plaintiffs and a Council committee as a means to settle the current redistricting lawsuit is presented below, as offered to the Common Council of New Albany.

As you can see, the first page begins with the Council being asked to take responsibility for violating the right of citizens to equal representation as mandated by law.



The second page continues with language noting involvement in the lawsuit, specifying that the parties wish to settle it prior to trial, and expressing the desire to establish new districts to ensure that future elections are fair.

The next three numbered points are the conditions which, if agreed to by Council, would have settled the case and avoided having taxpayers foot the bill for the Council to defend a lawsuit, the facts of which Council President Larry Kochert doesn't even dispute.

Condition number one states that the Council will, sometime after January 1, 2008, establish an Advisory Committee on Redistricting made up of three at-large council members and three people chosen by the Council from a list provided by the plaintiffs. The committee's purpose would be to help explore options for lawful redistricting. Readers will note that the language in the agreement neither requires payment for committee members nor otherwise obligates this or future councils in any way. It's simply a mechanism to begin discussions and keep the process moving in a public manner.

Condition number two states that the Council will pay the plaintiffs' attorney's fees and expenses incurred thus far, as the Council had to be legally prodded to take seriously its public obligation after failing to do so since at least 2002. The proper amount would be determined by the court rather than the plaintiffs or defendants, again to ensure fairness.

Condition three states that, although the lawsuit would be settled, the court would maintain the authority to monitor the process, making certain that both plaintiffs and defendants follow through on the agreement in a legal manner.

The signature section begins after that and continues on the third page.





The gist of it is this: In the interest of reaching settlement and avoiding the unnecessary expenditure of additional public funds, the plaintiffs worked in good faith with a council committee to remove language from prior settlement drafts reported as objectionable to a majority of council members.

We produced a bare bones document that as simply as possible required three essential items:

That the Council be accountable for its wrongdoing; that the Council pay for the expenses incurred in addressing its ongoing refusal to correct that wrongdoing; and that the Council agree to start a legitimate discussion about creating fair voting districts.

Plaintiff Lloyd Wimp made it very clear during the meeting that the above was the final of several settlement offers. But, rather than agreeing with the plaintiffs to honor one of the most basic of civic principles-- a belief in fair and equal representation-- Council Members Donnie Blevins, Dan Coffey, Larry Kochert, Steve Price, and Bill Schmidt chose to defend a lawsuit at taxpayer expense. What they're defending remains to be determined.

ESNA Oktoberfest meeting tonight features Price, Scharlow and a guy who plays spoons.

For its October meeting tonight (October 10, 2007), the East Spring Street Neighborhood Association has scheduled as guests Steve Price (D-Dubious) & Brenda Scharlow (R), candidates for the 3rd district city council seat. The meeting will be held at Muir Manor, which is located on the corner of East Spring Street and 13th.

Questions previously addressed to the mayoral forum attendees candidates will be repeated -- more often to Price than to Scharlow. The neighborhood association's business meeting will be from 7:00 to 7:30 p.m., with the guests arriving at 7:30.

Republican Brenda Scharlow's platform includes ordinance enforcement and promoting business downtown, while the extremely nominal and syntax challenged Democrat Price "value's your taxpayer dollars," "identifies problems and implores solutions," and once played geetar for the Darlins on the old Andy Griffith Show.

No beer allowed. Too bad.

Leotard-clad lyrics for Tuesday.

Ira and George Gershwin

(verse)
Things have come to a pretty pass,
Our romance is growing flat,
For you like this and the other
While I go for this and that.
Goodness knows what the end will be;
Oh, I don't know where I'm at ...
It looks as if we two will never be one,
Something must be done.

(refrain)
You say eether and I say eyether,
You say neether and I say nyther;
Eether, eyether, neether, nyther,
Let's call the whole thing off!
You like potato and I like potahto,
You like tomato and I like tomahto;
Potato, potahto, tomato, tomahto!
Let's call the whole thing off!
But oh! If we call the whole thing off,
Then we must part.
And oh! If we ever part,
Then that might break my heart!
So, if you like pajamas and I like pajahmas,
I'll wear pajamas and give up pajahmas.
For we know we need each other,
So we better call the calling off off.
Let's call the whole thing off!

You say laughter and I say lawfter,
You say after and I say awfter;
Laughter, lawfter, after, awfter,
Let's call the whole thing off!
You like vanilla and I like vanella,
You, sa's'parilla and I sa's'parella;
Vanilla, vanella, Choc'late, strawb'ry!
Let's call the whole thing off!
But oh! If we call the whole thing off,
Then we must part.
And oh! If we ever part,
Then that might break my heart!
So, if you go for oysters and I go for ersters
I'll order oysters and cancel the ersters.
For we know we need each other,
So we better call the calling off off!
Let's call the whole thing off!

----

Costly redistricting stalemate looms for New Albany City Council, plaintiffs, by Eric Scott Campbell (News & Tribune).

David Matthews really showed me, didn’t he?

Well, actually no; he didn’t. He didn't show me anything, and that's the problem.

As is the curious habit of the political party he leads, Dave aimed low and missed the target, lifting gracefully ineffectual dust devils while providing discerning readers with all too much of nothing, and insisting all the while that his party's conceptual vacuousness is in fact made of something so vitally important that he continues to decline frequent invitations to concretely define it.

At the conclusion of more than 700 words devoted to stale rhetoric and a bit of deft soft shoe, the veil of secrecy remains firmly draped atop the heroic sandstone statue of Randy Hubbard, uniformed and armed, erected by Republicans as a symbol of “leadership,” but one that is just as uncommunicative as most pigeon-gathering stations in public squares the world over tend to be.

Think: "Schlock of Gibraltar," as scored and staged by your friendly local (dare we say it) Karl Rove wannabeen.

MATTHEWS: Substantive talk is taking place in forums

I would love to respond to Roger Baylor’s recent opinion published in the New Albany Tribune concerning the Randy Hubbard-Doug England race for New Albany mayor.

As a side note, I’m guessing that Dave Matthews was taught the importance of context in attribution, and when he omits it, one can only surmise that he does so intentionally.

Of course, anyone can peruse this blog or any other for ammunition to support or attack almost any position and surely find it, and Dave’s probably correct in assuming that the subtleties of scholarship and erudition aren’t the primary concern of voters that he and the GOP target with their current “platform,” one composed entirely of slimings of Doug England.

Note however that Dave is capable of neat stylistic pirouettes of his own, such as taking NAC’s suggestion that the intelligence of voters is insulted by a candidate who won’t publicly discuss platform planks with his opponent, and flipping it over to accuse us of insulting the intelligence of voters by asking them to consider substance.

Gads ... those poor, incapable voters. Having to think! Quick, Dave -- go fetch a straw man and a few broom handles before a thought breaks out.

Okay, so let's get down to the basics. Noting that NAC’s criticism of Randy Hubbard’s mayoral campaign has focused on one central point, this being Hubbard’s persistent inability or plain unwillingness to offer substantive platform planks and address these planks in a public debate forum with his opponent in such a manner that his recognition of problems and consideration of potential solutions are evident to onlookers, readers are begged to peruse Dave’s Saturday column in an effort to locate any such planks.

In fact, there are none, and the GOP chairman all but concedes that there are not likely to be any indications of his candidate’s grasp of specifics or insights as to a possible governing strategy during what remains of the campaign season.

Looks to me like you don’t have to be a “self-proclaimed Web blog czar” to see that NAC has won that particular argument. In place of substantive discussion, Dave leaves us with this alternative:

I’ll take honesty, integrity and leadership over experience any day.

To each his own.

Last winter, when I was looking for a surgeon to repair my shoulder injury, it seemed a good idea to select one who’d done the operation previously rather than one who hadn’t. The surgeon I found was able to brief me beforehand, explain the problem with my rotator cuff, and describe comprehensively how he was going to approach fixing it.

Was he telling me “what I wanted to hear?" Absolutely, because what I wanted to hear was that he understood my problem and had a plan for resolving it.

Had my surgeon followed the scant outlines of the Randy Hubbard Hands-Off Model of civic management grudgingly handed to us so far by the party chairman (talk about "tinkle-down" effects), I suppose he’d have told me what a great guy he is and then asked me if I had any thoughts as to how he should proceed rebuilding the rotator cuff.

No, thanks. It seems to me that there are times when it’s just a better choice to go with experience and proven skills rather than trust an informal polling of sidewalk superintendents and street corner passers-by.

And that’s why I’ll be voting for Doug England in November, and why this whole artificially inflated "character" discussion reminds me of Abraham Lincoln's response to Ulysses S. Grant's purported drinking problem:

"Tell me what brand of whiskey that Grant drinks. I would like to send a barrel of it to my other generals."

By the way, Dave – where’s that Brenda Scharlow yard sign you said you’d get for me? After all, our sitting councilman remains a nonentity and a civic embarrassment ... and I'm a bi-partisan type of guy, at least when my intelligence isn't being insulted by denizens of the exurban veld.

Those $50 per diems sure add up. Fermenters, anyone?

When the conceptually transgendered Vicki “Professor Erik” Denhart, overwhelmed by spite and envy, unleashes howlers like this these …

Is this strictly political? Or is this for financial gain to build a brewery downtown?

This Redistricting issue is about a small group of citizens who feel their 14th Amendment Rights have been violated. So...what about the rest of us?

Why do they think they are so special?

Could it be the Plaintiffs have promised certain candidates they can deliver maybe 20 or 30 votes for them if they speak out for their Redistricting plan?*

… do you find yourself wondering how much accumulated embarrassment can be endured by Denhart’s co-conspirator, Ms. Bolovschak, before the latter finally opts to pull the plug on her affiliation with local trogdom’s Looney Tune Digest?

----

Earlier in the week, a reader pointed to another hilarious Freedom of Speech gaffe, as written in a listing of purported platform planks of Steve "38% Solution" Price, who is praised because he ...

“Identifies problems and implores solutions.”

Urgently begs for solutions? Be nice if he would EXPLORE and/or SUGGEST some solutions.

IAH, I think Ms. Denhart meant that Price “deplores” solutions, although a better word might be “implodes,” as in: NAC has considered "imploring" the government of Zimbabwe to assist us in "deploring" Price's pathetic political performance lest our neighborhood implode.

----

We’ve received a report that prior to the Harvest Homecoming parade, councilman Price was cruising the alleyways of the imploding neighborhood that his solutions so consistently implore when he paused momentarily to deplore members of the East Spring Street Neighborhood Association, who Price accuses of stealing his political yard signs.

Assured that this accusation wasn’t true, Price was unappeased, insisting that word be passed along to ESNA that members of the association are not to pilfer his campaign materials.

Does this mean that ESNA non-members in the city are free to collect them instead?

Personal to Jethro Bodine: You’re right. He does make you look good, doesn’t he?

----

* as screeched in "PlAINTIFF'S OUTRAGEOUS DEMANDS," a crayon diatribe at FOS. Big P, small l, big A ...

A few parade views.

Harvest Homecoming's 40th anniversary parade passed by the house yesterday, and we were ready with beer, chili and cigars.

1st district councilman Dan Coffey, who was nowhere to be seen atop the Democratic Party's float, instead donned his Sunday best in celebration of the Gang of Four's academic achievement.

Meanwhile, GOP chairman Dave Matthews assembled his scant flock of aspirants, and most of them were facing "left" while passing NAC Party Central.

Here's a view of Democratic mayoral candidate Doug England.

Thanks to everyone who turned out for the bash.

So much for the Cubs.

More on Sunday ...

Here it is: The official parade party slogan for 2007.

Open thread: What does it mean for a public works project to pay for itself?

Bluegill asked this question in another thread after a discussion developed about the existing downtown parking garage and prospects for a new one:


What does it mean for a public works project to pay for itself? Is it the direct repayment of dollars like collecting parking fees at a garage or something else, like a quality of life issues that indirectly lead to more dollars by making someone want to be around, raising property values, private spending levels, and economic opportunities?


We already know how the conjoined councilmen feel. Your opinions?

Has anyone seen the senior editor?

Hey, what ever happened to me, anyway … or, as Ronald Reagan once said, “Where’s the rest of me?”

Note that Reagan actually spoke these words long before he became the nation’s favorite “just remember the good times” President.

Well, I’ve been busy. Here is the Top Ten list, with room for a dozen more.

10. Keeping up with the conclusion of the baseball season and the beginning of the playoffs. My Oakland Athletics were eliminated early, but just wail ‘til next year.

9. Watching all 16 hours of the Ken Burns documentary, “The War,” and concluding that in spite of the epiphanies and rare color footage, the series was a noble but flawed effort, in desperate need of editing, and in the end, something that failed to live up to the premise.

8. Listening to the reformed Crowded House’s elegiac “Time on Earth,” yet another nearly perfect pop rock album from Neil Finn and Co., an preparing to spin the new Springsteen.

7. Scientific sampling of Progressive Pints as the annual NA Confidential/NABC Harvest Homecoming parade party approaches (see NAC on Friday for the unveiling of this year’s official party slogan).

6. Noticing that my cheeks were wet at the conclusion of the incredible German film, “The Lives of Others,” which is available on DVD. Get it and watch it now. (Thanks, Ed).

5. Assisting my business partners in what amounts to a company-wide reorganization as we make preparations to expand.

4. Examining the floor drains, roofs and load bearing walls in downtown buildings (see the preceding). My only regret is that for us to achieve our goals, we’ll have to enrich either Steve Price’s or Dan Coffey’s council district. Perhaps we can be gerrymandered into Jeff Gahan’s 6th?

3. Reeling in shock and suspicion as erstwhile entrenched ideological opposites make seeming gestures of reconciliation. Ready for another quote from the Gipper? “Trust, but verify.”

2. Doing the chronological math in an effort to determine whether Coffey actually could be Joe McCarthy’s unclaimed love child. The resemblances are to striking for the two to have evolved independently, don’t you think?

1. Honing my credentials as a card-carrying atheist, communist, hedonist and (gasp) pagan in preparation for crawling into a local politician’s bed and giving the Luddites, know-nothings and wannabeens another well-deserved conniption fit.

It's four minutes and forty-four seconds you'll never get back

... and it would take hours to explain every lie and hypocrisy therein. Up with the volume and down with the IQ.



The senior editor thanks Bluegill, and adds: Here are three supplemental views of the Wizard in mid-tirade.

Once again, we provide you with abundant evidence that Dan Coffey has only one fundamental and abiding political "plank": New Albany's pie must remain forever small, and only Coffey decides how big to carve the slices.

The fact that within such a self-serving philosophy lies not an iota of hope for education, economic development, and human advancement has by now become pathetically self-evident, although it illustrates what the city is up against in its struggle to revitalize far better than the decidedly non-ironic councilman ever could fathom.

Dan Coffey vs. the future. Bets, anyone?

Conjoined councilmen ready their Bics: Rag picking, rental property management and investing in the community.

New Albany downtown plan: Hotel, conventions; Isenberg Properties wants to continue Scribner Place development, by Eric Scott Campbell (News and Tribune).

A five-story hotel and adjacent convention center would sit atop a parking garage at Pearl and Main streets in New Albany in an area developer’s $20 million to $25 million plan for the second phase of Scribner Place.

When the two sincere and well-prepared ladies presenting this proposal began speaking to the council members, veterans in the crowd shuddered and scratched their heads: Hadn’t they been warned to wear flak jackets?

Predictably conjoined councilmen Dan Coffey and his echo, Steve Price, duly clucked, wagged fingers and discoursed as to the impossibility of progress, with Coffey insisting that city government immediately pay to have an economic impact study completed for the proposed development.

NAC’s prediction: If and when the impact study is produced, Coffey will take the opportunity to lambaste it for wasting taxpayer monies, then join Price in voting against $6 million to leverage $20 million in investments.

In other words, anti-business as usual, and who suffers? Coffey's and Price's constituents, who in spite of Coffey's geograpical confusion later in the meeting, do tend to reside downtown.

What's it gonna be, CM Blevins?

As four cacophonous years have passed, with at-large councilman Donnie Blevins forever dangling in the legislative wind, unable to settle on a core set of beliefs that might assist him in sorting through the pressures that come with being recognized as the perpetual swing vote, I’ve nonetheless defended him more often than not – and emphasized with him almost always.

I’d sit out there in the gallery during those nights when Blevins would be forced to make a decision, and you could see the contradictory cartoon figures, an angel and a devil, one on each of the councilman’s shoulders, and watch him almost visibly buckle beneath the responsibility of casting his vote for the Gang of Four on one side or the mostly reasonable group on the other, and I always knew it couldn’t be easy for him.

There were times when it was hard to watch. Sometimes Blevins would muster heroic oratory during the course of seemingly "getting it," while other times, he'd arrive in the council chambers like a schoolboy who'd just been taken to the woodshed ... and with Dan Coffey's belt marks shadowing his face. We'd nod, and think yep -- this time the Gang got to him last, and he rolled over.

----

There is much about Monday’s last night’s city council meeting that deserves comment, and Bluegill is working on it, but before I retire for the night, something must be written – perhaps gently, perhaps still with much empathy on my part – about Blevins’s performance.

It was as bad a job of acting as I’ve witnessed in four years, and it bodes ill as we approach a period when the Gang of Four, itself about to be dissolved after the November elections, might still be able to kneecap the city for a generation to come.

The Gang's rancor is elevated, and it is increasingly rabid, and the Luddites on the council seemingly are ready to make the whole community pay for its own inability to comprehend a modern world that no longer will permit ward-heelers to conduct balloting in their garages, tell tremendous whopping lies without audience members calling them on it, or being able to avoid howling laughter when they cowardly abstain on crucial votes.

Two weeks ago, the council determined to form a committee, made up of the body’s three at-large councilmen, for the purpose of communicating with the plaintiffs in the redistricting lawsuit (the author is one of them) so as to avoid trial. The merits of this case have been discussed at some length here, but what is relevant at the moment is that the council approved this measure, after which the lame duck Blevins promptly let it be known that he had no interest in participating alongside fellow at-large councilmen Jack Messer and Kevin Zurschmiede.

Not unexpectedly, Blevins did not attend Monday’s 6:00 p.m. fact-finding hearing, which concluded shortly before 6:30 p.m., at which time four of us descended the steps in route to a quick dinner at the Speakeasy, only to find Blevins chatting with workers in one of the offices downstairs.

Hours later, at the conclusion of the regular meeting, and as CM Messer presented his committee’s report to the remainder of the council, Blevins – who confessed to having read only a small bit of the plaintiff’s document as discussed at the committee meeting – erupted in indignation at the suggestions presented by the plaintiffs during a gathering that Blevins scoffed at attending even though he was two floors down by the time it ended, and almost certainly was there before that.

As I said, I’ve defended Blevins before, but his ineffectual performance tonight revealed a odiferous and disingenuous hypocrisy that approaches the level of that practiced routinely by Larry Kochert and Dan Coffey. You've no idea how depressing this is for me, because I always have retained hope that Blevins would be able to move beyond it.

Blevins, after all, was named to the redistricting committee. Perhaps – just perhaps – he might accept the assignment with the seriousness it deserves rather than play the Gang of Four’s brinksmanship game without contemplating first that he is their most dispensable pawn.

That's because blatant political sociopaths like Dan Coffey are interested in congenitally indecisive people like Donnie Blevins for one reason, and one reason only, and it’s the same reason that Coffey’s second reading of an ordinance that seeks to cripple the city’s ability to lawfully assist economic development passed last night on the strength of Blevins’s veritable coin-flip of a swing vote: To keep the string of power wrapped tightly around Coffey’s own pudgy, bullying knuckle, and if Blevins thinks that after all of this is over that Coffey will be inviting him to the Wizard’s Westside dirt-floor hovel for ice-cold barbecued bologna on a stale shingle, then all my theories about the ability of humans to adapt for the best interest of their own survival can be thrown out the window.

Too bad, Donnie. You coulda been someone, really. You’ve shown those glimmers, and I know you’ve felt them, too. But when you let people like Larry Kochert and Dan Coffey twist your arm, and when you find out that they’re not really laughing with you … well, it’s just sad, and all you’ve accomplished is to keep quite a few people poor, ignorant and without hope of redemption -- and I know that really isn't your intent.

Dan Coffey cares neither about you nor about them. He must perpetuate the civic rot in order to have people like you – and people like them – looking toward him as the instrument of their salvation. They're bound to be disappointed. So are you, Donnie.

Sorry, but someone had to say it. I understand that you believe in a higher power, and I'll readily confess that I don't, but I just wish there were some way that I could make you see the power that this city ideally possesses if the doers and the capable can shake free of the shackles imposed on them by the likes of Coffey and Steve Price.

Donnie, they're not helping people to become free. They're ensuring failure by promising gullible, desperate people that the hands of time can somehow be frozen. It's only an illusion, and at times, you've seemed to grasp that, although you've not been able to shake it for long enough to offer hope of a positive legacy. Right now, your legacy is mixed. There are five meetings left, and your term will then be over. However, you're lucky, because time remains for you to be a part of the solution and not the problem.

And I mean that sincerely. Perhaps Dan Coffey will print this off for you to read. He doesn't follow the blogs, you know. But he detests us just the same, and you -- Donnie Blevins -- know that he's wrong in feeling that way.

The question, then: What do you intend to do about it?

Rewriting history: It's "them people," not the Devil, that makes Coffey do it.

In the following passage, which I've edited from two e-mails this morning, NAC's Bluegill clearly explains this evening's proposed council chicanery. The text of 1st district councilman Dan Coffey's parking garage/TIF ordinance appears afterward. See also our earlier posting today: City Council love-fest 2-nite: And the magic number is six.

----

Dan Coffey is trying to rewrite history.

CM Coffey's ordinance seeks to force the use of over 3 million downtown TIF dollars to repay EDIT funds used on the State Street Parking garage.

The city originally set it up so that bond payments for the State Street garage, which is now paid off in full, were funded 2/3 by EDIT funds and 1/3 by TIF funds. Because a small portion of extra EDIT dollars was used during the life of the bond to make up a TIF shortfall, Coffey is now trying to claim that TIF has to repay the entire amount of EDIT dollars used on the project, which is not only incorrect based on the original agreement but also probably illegal as state law mandates that TIF funds can only be used on infrastructure improvements.

If this passes, all downtown TIF funds collected will be used towards repaying EDIT funds from the old project rather than on continued infrastructure improvements like the new parking garage. Since Coffey is insisting that *all* downtown TIF funds go towards his faulty repayment scheme, the city wouldn't be able to do any TIF financing downtown for years.

Again, it was understood at the time of bond issuance that TIF would not be enough to cover the bond payment and that a majority of the bond payment would come from EDIT. It was purposely and knowingly set up and voted on that way.

To repeat: Coffey is trying to rewrite history.

City Council love-fest 2-nite: And the magic number is six.

First, the good news: Any combination of city council meetings remaining in the year 2007 that total six, and the Gang of Four is reduced to the Dunderhead Duo at the stroke of midnight on December 31, when progressives will take to the streets and cheap champagne will be flowing by virtue of Larry Kochert’s voluntary step down, and Bill Schmidt’s rejection by the voters back in May.

Then again, by then, their replacements might include superannuated relics like James Hollis. But that’s okay. (Most of) our collective hair is sure to grow back even after pulling out by the roots.

In the interim, much havoc remains for wreaking by the bile-infused Neanderthal bloc, beginning tonight, when the spotlight shifts away from redistricting (I might buy myself a mohair suit for the approaching court date) and comes to rest squarely on the latest exciting plan to revitalize downtown, one to be submitted by investors this evening, and one, of course, that is certain to be opposed by the very councilmen representing the areas that stand to benefit the most from it.

Whih, in a nutshell, is New Albanian socio-cultural dysfunction at its very finest.

Previously at NAC: Luddite obstructionists mobilize to fight parking garages -- the latest atheist Commie threat.

Given the intimate link between rental properties and "Re-elect Steve Price to City Council" yard signs, perhaps the best way for the city to approach the new parking garage would be to pretend it is a massive slumlord empowerment property.

Predictably, at the Gang of Four’s semi-official news agency (Six Flags over Screechia), the professorial-pretend duo of Dork and Mindy are having a cow over the looming prospect of downtown infrastructure improvements.

Taxpayers -- we are being screwed by the parking garage project and the request to spend millions of dollars to build another downtown parking garage.

Sadly, half of Freedom of Speech’s "brain" trust knows better, but prefers fomenting self-serving chicanery to putting the muzzle on her decidedly junior partner in trognonymous slime.

Meanwhile, I had breakfast this morning with another of NAC’s friendly confidants, D.T. Redux, and here are excerpts from his comments, as recorded with my favorite Sharpie on a bacon-grease-stained napkin:

The bond issue for the downtown parking garage was always intended to be paid for by a combination of TIF funds and economic development taxes. All the parties to the building and financing of the project decided that it was important to economic development and all understood that the incremental taxes gained could not and would not be sufficient to pay off the bond.

About 2/3 of the annual debt service was always intended to be paid from EDIT tax funds (that's why they called it "economic development). That would be about $400K per year. New taxes generated by the infrastructure improvement were to have paid about $200K. When TIF revenues came up short and late, the debt service still had to be paid. So, the redevelopment commission gained approval from all concerned to use EDIT to make up the shortfall.

Now Mr. Coffey and Erika are pretending to believe (or, delusion being a New Albanian birth right, perhaps they really do believe) that all of the EDIT funds dedicated to retire the bonded indebtedness were somehow a robbery from the taxpayers that must be made good.

First of all, EDIT taxes were until a couple of summers ago restricted to use for economic development projects, which the garage surely was. Second, anyone who opposed the use of EDIT funds to service the garage debt was either silent or could not garner the votes to stop it.

Accordingly, any effort to reclaim every penny of EDIT taxes used for garage debt service is an attempt to cheat the system, to declare a do-over, to repeal the acts of previous administrations and councils who lawfully chose to use those funds as they determined. The only EDIT funds even remotely subject to any "promise" to repay were those used to round out the TIF shortfall. There's no way that the $400K expended each year should even be part of a conversation in this council.

The ordinance and resolution before the city council, however, seeks to reclaim every penny of EDIT money spent to build and pay for the garage. It does not limit itself to recouping the shortfall that EDIT covered, but asks that TIF become a new "riverboat" fund instead of the means to improve and provide incentives for downtown revitalization through infrastructure improvements.

To say that the TIF "owes" $3.6 million to EDIT is grossly inaccurate. Aren’t we all tired of listening to certain members of council denigrating all economic development while trying to fool people into believing every TIF and every incentive is a conspiracy to rob the taxpayers? In fact, a TIF is exactly the opposite of what Mr. Coffey and his allies would have us believe.

What did I do with that damned flower pot?