Big news: The Highwayman is back!
"And You Thought it Was Safe to Get Back in the Water"
I'm not back on the horse yet, but I am cleaning the saddle in preparation. Onward & upward!
What Lloyd has endured actually might be worse than a typical city council meeting … and speaking of the council, today we finally learn why Slippery Larry Kochert has chosen to opt out:
Field big for New Albany council; All nine posts up for grabs in fall, by Dick Kaukas (short shelf life for Courier-Journal links).
In District 4, Larry Kochert, a six-term incumbent, decided not to run. So has Beverly Crump, the District 5 incumbent. Their decisions mean the council is guaranteed to have at least two new members.
Kochert, the current president of the council, said part of the reason he decided against seeking another term is that many council members seem to be "headstrong" and "not willing to work together and compromise."
In the past, he said, even when there were more Republicans on the council, "we seemed to be able to work together better than this group has."
Evidently there are no mirrors in the Kochert household, only oily disingenuousness imbibed like laudanum. For more on this character trait, see:
City council president Larry Kochert admits to breaking the law, but had fingers crossed behind his back at the time.
Finally, as proof that one need not check decency at the door as a prerequisite for political involvement, there’s the lone voice of at-large council candidate John Gonder … making sense again.
Use It or Lose It
… I was reminded of an episode of Seinfeld in which George is trying to combine the satisfaction of two appetites, one of which is for food. As George tells Jerry of his plan, Jerry utters a candidate for best line ever as he says, "George we're trying to have a civilization here."
That is precisely the trouble with a short-sighted view of infrastructural inattention. We can avoid the pain of taxes. We can avoid the pain of decisions. But we are trying to have a civilization here …
Monday, April 09, 2007
Sunday, April 08, 2007
Clarksville’s first rental duplex came shortly thereafter, in 1784.
My pal Todd actually remembers what he was taught in school. Do you know what’s wrong with this picture?
Todd caught it, and wrote the Evening News to explain.
While out in Clarksville, I noticed a large billboard for Semonin Realtors. On it was printed:
This city was named after Clark. (He hung out with Lewis.) Nobody knows Clarksville better.
Apparently what they do not know is Clarksville history. Clarksville was named in honor of General George Rogers Clark, after the Virginia legislature granted the land to Clark and his troops for their service in the Revolutionary War. While General Clark was related to William Clark, who did indeed hang out with Meriwether Lewis on a cross country journey that started in Clarksville, the town was not named after William Clark. While I applaud the attempt at historical humor with their advertising, some simple fact checking would have taken care of this error.
— Todd Antz, Sellersburg
For his efforts, NAC awards Todd a free business plug: He is the owner of Keg Liquors in Clarksville and has the best package craft and imported store beer selection anywhere on the Sunnyside.
Photo credit: Todd Antz.
Saturday, April 07, 2007
REWIND ... From Norquist to Torquemada to Brambleberry: Pathologies of tax "reform."
Written by the senior editor, and originally published on August 13, 2006.
----
Grover Norquist, who famously seeks to reduce government to a size that can be conveniently drowned in William Howard Taft’s supersized bathtub, and who once compared the morality of the estate tax to that of the Holocaust, founded the Americans for Tax Reform organization during the administration of President Ronald Reagan.
If the sum of words written about ATR since that time were calculated in dollars, it probably would be equivalent to several times Bill Gates’s elongated fortune, but it seems to me that the organization’s own oft-repeated credo should suffice to tell us most of what we need to know about it.
“ATR opposes all tax increases as a matter of principle.”
Speaking personally, I interpret this as the fervent desire to take a blue pencil to the Constitution, substituting “I the individual” for “we the people.”
And I find it unacceptable in a civil society. In fact, I oppose ATR as a matter of principle.
----
Turning to the dictionary …
pa·thol·o·gyn. pl. pa·thol·o·gies
1. The scientific study of the nature of disease and its causes, processes, development, and consequences. Also called pathobiology.
2. The anatomic or functional manifestations of a disease: the pathology of cancer.
3. A departure or deviation from a normal condition: “Neighborhoods plagued by a self-perpetuating pathology of joblessness, welfare dependency, crime” (Time).
----
What, then, is the pathology of tax reform?
What is it that leads to the single-minded obsession, to the snarling condescension, and to the anti-communal narcissism so obviously inherent in the genre?
Finding an answer is important to me, because I’ve decided that I’m a taxpayer advocate, too, and furthermore, I’m no longer willing to permit my “anti-everything” crusading brethren to define the terms of taxpayer advocacy without a struggle.
Of course none of us actively seeks to pay more tax than we feel is justified, but apparently we differ significantly with regard to the tipping point that compels us to paint our faces, converge on Boston harbor to dump tea into the drink, and vote for Norquist-sanctioned candidates.
Moreover, I believe that taxation is not something that can be defined in the numerological sense – in dry, neutral, technocratic terms, although economists undoubtedly try their best.
Rather, it’s an intrinsically political issue with implications pertaining to power and financial decision-making that are pursued not in a detached laboratory, but in the real world of human society. One’s views on taxation undoubtedly bear a close relationship to one’s views on politics, society and even religion.
Although I’ve no intention of contesting that Norquist and his ATR claim allegiance from people across the political spectrum, it remains the case that the hardest core of the movement’s hardcore support comes from self-identified conservatives … and if one stalks the dark corridors of the right wing with a consistently stated aim of starving a “beast” into submission, it logically follows that this beastly straw man targeted in the anti-tax crosshairs stands somewhere to the left.
After all, if the beast is not an “enemy,” then why bother starving it in the first place?
Moreover, most people don’t propose to kill their own – only the “others.”
----
I believe that the existence of people living and working together in the evolving construct of human society is a state of being implicit in the art and practice of politics, which itself is necessary to negotiate matters of power, and insofar as we are human beings voluntarily living in communities with one another and deriving benefits from shared expenditures, I’m an unrepentant advocate of taxation as the necessary underpinning of a truly civil and functional society.
By writing these words in a public forum, I fully expect to be lashed by those local Torquemadas, particularly those of the Brambleberry “those who cannot do, prevent others from doing, too” persuasion, whose viewpoints with respect to strictly local taxes and fees mirrors the rabidity of Grover Norquist’s.
So be it. I simply don’t believe that our local government as presently constituted is a beast begging for euthanizing. Imperfect, perhaps, and as such reflecting the imperfections of its inhabitants and of the citizenry as a whole … but not a beast.
In fact, I believe it should be even more pervasive, and that we should pay our share to make it so.
----
Since you’ve asked, permit me to add that from my point of view, when Norquist’s hopping mad adherents speak specifically of taxation-related issues, I believe they’re actually speaking of just one component, albeit it vital, that ultimately is tied to the many planks of the conservative movement’s overall rightward march in America.
That zealous mission was elegantly summarized by the inimitable William Greider in a 2003 article in The Nation entitled “Rolling Back the 20th Century.”
Here are excerpts.
The movement's grand ambition--one can no longer say grandiose--is to roll back the twentieth century, quite literally. That is, defenestrate the federal government and reduce its scale and powers to a level well below what it was before the New Deal's centralization. With that accomplished, movement conservatives envision a restored society in which the prevailing values and power relationships resemble the America that existed around 1900, when William McKinley was President. Governing authority and resources are dispersed from Washington, returned to local levels and also to individuals and private institutions, most notably corporations and religious organizations. The primacy of private property rights is re-established over the shared public priorities expressed in government regulation. Above all, private wealth--both enterprises and individuals with higher incomes--are permanently insulated from the progressive claims of the graduated income tax.
These broad objectives may sound reactionary and destructive (in historical terms they are), but hard-right conservatives see themselves as liberating reformers, not destroyers, who are rescuing old American virtues of self-reliance and individual autonomy from the clutches of collective action and "statist" left-wingers. They do not expect any of these far-reaching goals to be fulfilled during Bush's tenure, but they do assume that history is on their side and that the next wave will come along soon (not an unreasonable expectation, given their great gains during the past thirty years). Right-wingers--who once seemed frothy and fratricidal--now understand that three steps forward, two steps back still adds up to forward progress. It's a long march, they say.
We all know the planks of the platform, as enumerated by Greider.
Gradually phase out the pension-fund retirement system as we know it.
Eliminate federal taxation of private capital, as the essential predicate for dismantling the progressive income tax.
Withdraw the federal government from a direct role in housing, healthcare, assistance to the poor and many other long-established social priorities.
Withdraw the federal government from a direct role in housing, healthcare, assistance to the poor and many other long-established social priorities.
Restore churches, families and private education to a more influential role in the nation's cultural life by giving them a significant new base of income--public money.
Strengthen the hand of business enterprise against burdensome regulatory obligations, especially environmental protection, by introducing voluntary goals and "market-driven" solutions.
Smash organized labor.
----
If this Federal beast is to be drowned, then there is no alternative to supporting a higher degree of decision making at local levels, but it should be obvious that starving the Federal “beast” translates directly and inescapably into starving ourselves, which in turn suggests that to some degree, we’ll have to pay more to maintain our standard of living, our infrastructure, and some semblance of a civil society, right here at home.
Speaking personally, I’d like to see this trend of beast eradication extended to my having the option to withhold federal tax revenue from wars that I believe to be unjust, illegal, or figments of George W. Bush’s restive imagination, but that improbability aside, how do we propose to pave and stripe the streets, keep the alleys clean, remunerate the police and fire departments, and perform the tasks that we take for granted as necessary components of local self-rule, when we simultaneously insist on voting for politicians who’ve consumed copious quantities of Norquist’s fascist Kool-Aid, and refuse to pay what it takes for local services when the same politician obeys his handler and denies us funding?
What are we supposed to do, beg funds from the local mega-church according to the principle of faith-based reverse Caesar – which I could have sworn was either a salad dressing or a pro wrestling hold?
----
Me?
I’m willing to pay my share to save my neighborhood and to ensure New Albany has a future. That’s more than can be said for the many “whatever it is, we’re against it” grandparents hereabouts, who continue to insist that Norquist’s starvation diet provides the perfect platform for the future interests of their grandchildren, something that is counterintuitive at best and purely insane at worst -- hence our bizarre and so characteristically New Albanian phenomenon of the Coup d’Geriatrique, an ongoing cabal conducted by so-called Democrats. It is directed not against Republicans, but deploys the Norquist playbook to savage the capable of all political and religious persuasions.
My 3rd District councilman – who insists against all prevailing evidence that he’s a Democrat, but whose right-wing pathologies are never hidden from view – is the prime example of this reaction against modernity even if he’s two decades younger than most other participants. Steve Price joyfully espouses the ATR party line, shrieking like a goosed banshee that errant nickels, misspent dimes and the perpetual tightening of belts will magically produce the revenue necessary to offset those monies being lost each time we gleefully vote for a pledged Norquistian, and incessantly associating the majority of governmental expenditures with frivolity and those aspects of human life with which he disagrees, misunderstands, detests and wishes to eradicate.
----
Progress, not regress. Progressive, not regressive. Forward, not backward.
That’s all I have to say on the matter, although there’s a chance that some of you will disagree.
Hit it ...
----
Grover Norquist, who famously seeks to reduce government to a size that can be conveniently drowned in William Howard Taft’s supersized bathtub, and who once compared the morality of the estate tax to that of the Holocaust, founded the Americans for Tax Reform organization during the administration of President Ronald Reagan.
If the sum of words written about ATR since that time were calculated in dollars, it probably would be equivalent to several times Bill Gates’s elongated fortune, but it seems to me that the organization’s own oft-repeated credo should suffice to tell us most of what we need to know about it.
“ATR opposes all tax increases as a matter of principle.”
Speaking personally, I interpret this as the fervent desire to take a blue pencil to the Constitution, substituting “I the individual” for “we the people.”
And I find it unacceptable in a civil society. In fact, I oppose ATR as a matter of principle.
----
Turning to the dictionary …
pa·thol·o·gyn. pl. pa·thol·o·gies
1. The scientific study of the nature of disease and its causes, processes, development, and consequences. Also called pathobiology.
2. The anatomic or functional manifestations of a disease: the pathology of cancer.
3. A departure or deviation from a normal condition: “Neighborhoods plagued by a self-perpetuating pathology of joblessness, welfare dependency, crime” (Time).
----
What, then, is the pathology of tax reform?
What is it that leads to the single-minded obsession, to the snarling condescension, and to the anti-communal narcissism so obviously inherent in the genre?
Finding an answer is important to me, because I’ve decided that I’m a taxpayer advocate, too, and furthermore, I’m no longer willing to permit my “anti-everything” crusading brethren to define the terms of taxpayer advocacy without a struggle.
Of course none of us actively seeks to pay more tax than we feel is justified, but apparently we differ significantly with regard to the tipping point that compels us to paint our faces, converge on Boston harbor to dump tea into the drink, and vote for Norquist-sanctioned candidates.
Moreover, I believe that taxation is not something that can be defined in the numerological sense – in dry, neutral, technocratic terms, although economists undoubtedly try their best.
Rather, it’s an intrinsically political issue with implications pertaining to power and financial decision-making that are pursued not in a detached laboratory, but in the real world of human society. One’s views on taxation undoubtedly bear a close relationship to one’s views on politics, society and even religion.
Although I’ve no intention of contesting that Norquist and his ATR claim allegiance from people across the political spectrum, it remains the case that the hardest core of the movement’s hardcore support comes from self-identified conservatives … and if one stalks the dark corridors of the right wing with a consistently stated aim of starving a “beast” into submission, it logically follows that this beastly straw man targeted in the anti-tax crosshairs stands somewhere to the left.
After all, if the beast is not an “enemy,” then why bother starving it in the first place?
Moreover, most people don’t propose to kill their own – only the “others.”
----
I believe that the existence of people living and working together in the evolving construct of human society is a state of being implicit in the art and practice of politics, which itself is necessary to negotiate matters of power, and insofar as we are human beings voluntarily living in communities with one another and deriving benefits from shared expenditures, I’m an unrepentant advocate of taxation as the necessary underpinning of a truly civil and functional society.
By writing these words in a public forum, I fully expect to be lashed by those local Torquemadas, particularly those of the Brambleberry “those who cannot do, prevent others from doing, too” persuasion, whose viewpoints with respect to strictly local taxes and fees mirrors the rabidity of Grover Norquist’s.
So be it. I simply don’t believe that our local government as presently constituted is a beast begging for euthanizing. Imperfect, perhaps, and as such reflecting the imperfections of its inhabitants and of the citizenry as a whole … but not a beast.
In fact, I believe it should be even more pervasive, and that we should pay our share to make it so.
----
Since you’ve asked, permit me to add that from my point of view, when Norquist’s hopping mad adherents speak specifically of taxation-related issues, I believe they’re actually speaking of just one component, albeit it vital, that ultimately is tied to the many planks of the conservative movement’s overall rightward march in America.
That zealous mission was elegantly summarized by the inimitable William Greider in a 2003 article in The Nation entitled “Rolling Back the 20th Century.”
Here are excerpts.
The movement's grand ambition--one can no longer say grandiose--is to roll back the twentieth century, quite literally. That is, defenestrate the federal government and reduce its scale and powers to a level well below what it was before the New Deal's centralization. With that accomplished, movement conservatives envision a restored society in which the prevailing values and power relationships resemble the America that existed around 1900, when William McKinley was President. Governing authority and resources are dispersed from Washington, returned to local levels and also to individuals and private institutions, most notably corporations and religious organizations. The primacy of private property rights is re-established over the shared public priorities expressed in government regulation. Above all, private wealth--both enterprises and individuals with higher incomes--are permanently insulated from the progressive claims of the graduated income tax.
These broad objectives may sound reactionary and destructive (in historical terms they are), but hard-right conservatives see themselves as liberating reformers, not destroyers, who are rescuing old American virtues of self-reliance and individual autonomy from the clutches of collective action and "statist" left-wingers. They do not expect any of these far-reaching goals to be fulfilled during Bush's tenure, but they do assume that history is on their side and that the next wave will come along soon (not an unreasonable expectation, given their great gains during the past thirty years). Right-wingers--who once seemed frothy and fratricidal--now understand that three steps forward, two steps back still adds up to forward progress. It's a long march, they say.
We all know the planks of the platform, as enumerated by Greider.
Gradually phase out the pension-fund retirement system as we know it.
Eliminate federal taxation of private capital, as the essential predicate for dismantling the progressive income tax.
Withdraw the federal government from a direct role in housing, healthcare, assistance to the poor and many other long-established social priorities.
Withdraw the federal government from a direct role in housing, healthcare, assistance to the poor and many other long-established social priorities.
Restore churches, families and private education to a more influential role in the nation's cultural life by giving them a significant new base of income--public money.
Strengthen the hand of business enterprise against burdensome regulatory obligations, especially environmental protection, by introducing voluntary goals and "market-driven" solutions.
Smash organized labor.
----
If this Federal beast is to be drowned, then there is no alternative to supporting a higher degree of decision making at local levels, but it should be obvious that starving the Federal “beast” translates directly and inescapably into starving ourselves, which in turn suggests that to some degree, we’ll have to pay more to maintain our standard of living, our infrastructure, and some semblance of a civil society, right here at home.
Speaking personally, I’d like to see this trend of beast eradication extended to my having the option to withhold federal tax revenue from wars that I believe to be unjust, illegal, or figments of George W. Bush’s restive imagination, but that improbability aside, how do we propose to pave and stripe the streets, keep the alleys clean, remunerate the police and fire departments, and perform the tasks that we take for granted as necessary components of local self-rule, when we simultaneously insist on voting for politicians who’ve consumed copious quantities of Norquist’s fascist Kool-Aid, and refuse to pay what it takes for local services when the same politician obeys his handler and denies us funding?
What are we supposed to do, beg funds from the local mega-church according to the principle of faith-based reverse Caesar – which I could have sworn was either a salad dressing or a pro wrestling hold?
----
Me?
I’m willing to pay my share to save my neighborhood and to ensure New Albany has a future. That’s more than can be said for the many “whatever it is, we’re against it” grandparents hereabouts, who continue to insist that Norquist’s starvation diet provides the perfect platform for the future interests of their grandchildren, something that is counterintuitive at best and purely insane at worst -- hence our bizarre and so characteristically New Albanian phenomenon of the Coup d’Geriatrique, an ongoing cabal conducted by so-called Democrats. It is directed not against Republicans, but deploys the Norquist playbook to savage the capable of all political and religious persuasions.
My 3rd District councilman – who insists against all prevailing evidence that he’s a Democrat, but whose right-wing pathologies are never hidden from view – is the prime example of this reaction against modernity even if he’s two decades younger than most other participants. Steve Price joyfully espouses the ATR party line, shrieking like a goosed banshee that errant nickels, misspent dimes and the perpetual tightening of belts will magically produce the revenue necessary to offset those monies being lost each time we gleefully vote for a pledged Norquistian, and incessantly associating the majority of governmental expenditures with frivolity and those aspects of human life with which he disagrees, misunderstands, detests and wishes to eradicate.
----
Progress, not regress. Progressive, not regressive. Forward, not backward.
That’s all I have to say on the matter, although there’s a chance that some of you will disagree.
Hit it ...
Given the choice of these three ...
I'm voting for the good used tires. At least there's an outside chance they might take us some place good.Friday, April 06, 2007
Family Matters
Unlike NAC's Senior Editor, I don’t speak with the authority of someone who’s built a local cultural institution from the ground up. But, hey, I married well.
Pardon the indulgence and check out what Mrs. Bluegill is up to this evening:
21C Museum Foundation presents Finding Family, curated by Karen Gillenwater, Director of Art Galleries and Curator of Collections at Georgetown College. This exhibition strives to explore the diversity that exists within today’s families and the ways in which that diversity affects us individually and society in general. The idea of family is typically connected with words like “tradition” and “values,” making it seem like a sacred, unchanging concept. However, family is difficult to define and constantly evolving. Finding Family includes works of art by regional and national artists in diverse media, including photography, video, textile, collage and installation. Through these works of art, the artists share their personal concepts of family and explore society’s views toward family. Presented in gallery 1 atrium level of 21C Museum at 700 West Main Street, the exhibition runs from March 6 through May 12, 2007.
Reception | Friday, April 6th
Please join the artists and curator for a reception in the atrium gallery on April 6th from 6-8pm (wine and hors d’oeuvres provided by Proof on Main). Immediately following the reception there will be a musical performance by Ben Solee and friends until 10pm.
The reception is a part of the monthly First Friday Gallery Hop. For the uninitiated, 21c and the whole Louisville Main St. - Market St. corridor provide easy access to the local art and culture scene in a setting that showcases the adaptive reuse of historic buildings and some heavy duty foreshadowing of what New Albany's future holds.
If you're anything like me, you'll spend at least a portion of your evening explaining that to whomever will listen. And trust me, they are listening.
Prof. Erika plays to her base ... she slides headfirst ... it's a two-bagger, folks.
Look Gladys, it's a sign. What does it say -- looks like "we buy houses?" Nah, it's not orange.
No, silly -- Freedom to Screech is running for city council, and she's bagless! Eeeck!
Oh, I get it. It's a sign, all right -- of the apocalypse.
Photo credits: "V"
Thursday, April 05, 2007
"Why don't we get this two or three years ago?"
The City Council argued about the still unresolved fire department hiring ordinance again Monday night.
The Mayor finally took control on Tuesday; with the Board of Public Works passing its own hiring resolution.
The media has been all over it.
Where was 3rd district uncouncilman Steve Price in that mix?
Wondering what was going on, as usual.
As of Monday night’s meeting, Price made it clear he didn’t know. He didn’t know that the Council had been considering the ordinance for the majority of his reign of error. He didn't remember without prompting that he was part of the hold up; having earlier voted against the ordinance his colleagues had developed after months of work and suggested revisions.
He did, however, use his cluelessness as an excuse to cheap shot progress in the form of a spiteful, completely irrelevant jab at Scribner Place, a battle he lost in July of 2005.
That’s what some of us call a triple double and it’s worthy of replay.
*Apologies for the shaky video. Tripod-less videography while laughing is difficult. Make sure your volume is up.
The Mayor finally took control on Tuesday; with the Board of Public Works passing its own hiring resolution.
The media has been all over it.
Where was 3rd district uncouncilman Steve Price in that mix?
Wondering what was going on, as usual.
As of Monday night’s meeting, Price made it clear he didn’t know. He didn’t know that the Council had been considering the ordinance for the majority of his reign of error. He didn't remember without prompting that he was part of the hold up; having earlier voted against the ordinance his colleagues had developed after months of work and suggested revisions.
He did, however, use his cluelessness as an excuse to cheap shot progress in the form of a spiteful, completely irrelevant jab at Scribner Place, a battle he lost in July of 2005.
That’s what some of us call a triple double and it’s worthy of replay.
*Apologies for the shaky video. Tripod-less videography while laughing is difficult. Make sure your volume is up.
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
Three cheers for the king
Like everyone else in the city, Mayor James Garner has had to spend an inordinant amount of time trying to circumvent a disinterested, dysfunctional City Council. Yesterday, he did so admirably in moving to resolve the firefighter hiring situation. My only complaint is that it took him as long as it did.
While I haven't always agreed with Garner, no one who's been paying attention for the past few years could disagree with his most recent statement that the Council has created "a mockery of the democratic process", casually and consistently ignoring whichever laws apply to their actions and allowing irrelevant personal disputes to overcome professional responsibility.
To be sure, fingers will be pointed, lawyers will be consulted, and nary a grandstanding opportunity will be missed. Through it all, though, no one on the Council will be able to offer a rational explanation beyond their own collective incompetence as to why the firefighter hiring situation has gone unresolved since being presented to them in late 2005.
That's because there isn't one.
Keep that in mind as they and others line up to testify about the evils of the executive branch.
Firefighters' hiring plan OK'd: New Albany mayor defies City Council by Dick Kaukas, The Courier-Journal
While I haven't always agreed with Garner, no one who's been paying attention for the past few years could disagree with his most recent statement that the Council has created "a mockery of the democratic process", casually and consistently ignoring whichever laws apply to their actions and allowing irrelevant personal disputes to overcome professional responsibility.
To be sure, fingers will be pointed, lawyers will be consulted, and nary a grandstanding opportunity will be missed. Through it all, though, no one on the Council will be able to offer a rational explanation beyond their own collective incompetence as to why the firefighter hiring situation has gone unresolved since being presented to them in late 2005.
That's because there isn't one.
Keep that in mind as they and others line up to testify about the evils of the executive branch.
Firefighters' hiring plan OK'd: New Albany mayor defies City Council by Dick Kaukas, The Courier-Journal
There's only one card higher than a King ...
As illustrated by this entertaining artwork, which was submitted several weeks ago by a regular NAC reader with a sense of the surreal, edict-wielding city council prez Larry Kochert had aleady laid convincing claim to the title of King long before Tuesday's meeting of the Board of Public Works.
And as we all know, there ain't enough room in this here town for two sovereigns ...
Confused? See: Three cheers for the king ... later today.*
----
* The senior editor is backfillin' again. These new non-narcotic pain meds aren't bad at all.
And as we all know, there ain't enough room in this here town for two sovereigns ...
Confused? See: Three cheers for the king ... later today.*
----
* The senior editor is backfillin' again. These new non-narcotic pain meds aren't bad at all.
Tuesday, April 03, 2007
New police cars? Price is against it, but ...
Over at New Albany 15A, Coop has coverage of last night's city council meeting:
"Resolution passes" are you kidding me? Really? Are you sure?
Also, Eric Scott Campbell's coverage is up at the Tribune's web site.
"Resolution passes" are you kidding me? Really? Are you sure?
Also, Eric Scott Campbell's coverage is up at the Tribune's web site.
If any one knows
...how to post a great big mirror on the World Wide Web, please leave detailed instructions below.
Monday, April 02, 2007
Album Release Party TONIGHT
The lads are back!
Having sequestered themselves in the hallowed back yard studios of Dewey Heights Productions following their remarkable debut tour playing for tens of screaming children in strip mall parking lots across the region over the course of 18 days, Steve Price and the Same Song Singers are poised to unleash Standing Up For You, a sonic cacophony the likes of which New Albanians have never heard since at least a couple of weeks ago.
The tour was undoubtedly a major influence in the further development of the band’s sound. Upon returning home, Manager Dave Ramsey was overheard relating tales of how the band escaped the usual pitfalls of rock and roll life on the road in an effort to live the songs to their fullest.
“Of all the bands and all the tours”, said Ramsey, “I’ve never seen anyone take their art and themselves so seriously. A lot of guys blow their money on fast food and Super 8 motels, but not Steve and SSS. There’s a Kroger or a Sam’s Club in nearly every town around here and we kept a Styrofoam cooler stocked with sandwiches. Not only did it save $74.83 on food, but it also gave the bus driver something to do while the boys were playing. If it weren’t for sandwich prep, he’d have sat idle at times for up to 35 minutes. That’s not what we pay him for."
In listening to an advanced copy of the new record, one can almost smell the damp washcloths the band used to freshen up, having decided to “kill the air” on the bus after paying for a fuel stop with a credit card nearly led to a mid-tour breakup.
Indeed, songs like “Must Stop Blacktop” and “Riding High but Feeling Low (Officer Kru(m)pke Shakedown Mix)” were written the only way they could’ve been: by four men struggling to carry the weight of their bus toilet holding tank to the small creek out behind the Henryville rest stop on I-65.
It’s real, it’s now, and it’s live tonight at 7:30 p.m. in the third floor meeting room of the City/County Building.
City Clerk Marcey Wisman has provided a tentative set list here.
*Citing creative differences concerning the use of deceased equines as percussion instruments, drummer Dan Coffey has been on temporary hiatus since recording. He'll play tonight, but only to someone else's beat.
**The bus driver, too, has split the scene, matriculating into the Sandwich Arts program at Subway. Though early press reports indicated an amicable separation, some girl at the rest stop seemed to think otherwise. "I'm working my way up to bands, so I can understand trying to improve your lot", she said, "but Bucky should've known better than to take out a student loan. He didn't last ten minutes after I told everybody."
Electronic trench warfare paralyzes 3rd district council e-campaigns.
Excuse this bit of admitted backfilling. Not wanting the interrupt the cadence of today’s main post, and yet seeking to add this to the archival record for posterity’s sake, I’m inserting it using an earlier time stamp … RAB)
There’ll be much more to say at another time about the abject failure of local political culture to adapt to the electronic age, but for now, I’ll confine my survey to the 3rd council district, where all three Democratic candidates have blogs, but usage varies considerably.
By choosing not to permit comments from readers, incumbent councilman Steve Price served notice from the beginning that he remains disinterested in any genuine discussion of real issues; now, apparently having reached the pragmatic conclusion that any words he publishes on-line probably will be read only by the literate segment of the populace that already vigorously opposes him, Price has published absolutely nothing since March 6.
So much wisdom waiting to be pulled from grandma’s cigar box, and so little time to put the cart behind the horse before the Nazis come to take the VFW’s video poker machines.
Price’s silence, while in keeping with his stance of aloof detachment from any topic outside his narrow comfort zone, would seem provide a perfect opportunity for the two remaining candidates to define themselves. Such self-definition became even more crucial to the district after Charlie Harshfield’s late candidacy split the anti-Price vote.
In March, one-time councilman and current challenger Maury Goldberg offered three substantive postings, one each on the drug problem in neighborhoods, rental property inspections and tax abatements. These are much appreciated, and yet Maury continues to visible display signs of discomfort with the blogging format’s chief virtues of timeliness, flexibility and immediacy. It’s a fluid, adaptable medium, and it demands to be deployed in like fashion.
Charlie Harshfield – the last-minute, surprise candidate, and of the three, the one with the toughest of all name recognition nuts to crack – has oddly opted for silence in the blogosphere. A March 12 posting listed seven solid if briefly sketched platform goals, and generated a spirited discussion, but little else has followed. It is not unfair to suggest that Charlie needs 100% of the 3rd district’s progressives to have a chance of winning. Is this the way to find and retain them?
While Price’s muzzle is understandable – he’s comically prone to colossal linguistic gaffes and mutilates facts in the same fashion as psychotic cats torture mice – it defies our expectations of “reform” candidates to witness their bizarre hesitancy to regularly use some of the best tools available (i.e., the Internet) to articulate the need for reform.
All over town, “opposition” candidates are making the critical mistake of playing by “old school” rules. If these challengers wait too long to step outside the box, the results are going to be ugly, indeed.
As of the morning of April 2, 2007, here’s the rundown:
Days since last activity at Charlie Harshfield’s blog: 16.
Total posts since March 1: 3.
Days since last activity at Maury Goldberg’s blog: 4.
Total posts since March 1: 7.
Days since last activity at Steve Price’s blog: 26.
Total posts since March 1: 1.
Note: Maury Goldberg started his blog in October, 2005. Steve Price’s began in early January, 2007. Charlie Harshfield’s went up in Februart, 2007.
There’ll be much more to say at another time about the abject failure of local political culture to adapt to the electronic age, but for now, I’ll confine my survey to the 3rd council district, where all three Democratic candidates have blogs, but usage varies considerably.
By choosing not to permit comments from readers, incumbent councilman Steve Price served notice from the beginning that he remains disinterested in any genuine discussion of real issues; now, apparently having reached the pragmatic conclusion that any words he publishes on-line probably will be read only by the literate segment of the populace that already vigorously opposes him, Price has published absolutely nothing since March 6.
So much wisdom waiting to be pulled from grandma’s cigar box, and so little time to put the cart behind the horse before the Nazis come to take the VFW’s video poker machines.
Price’s silence, while in keeping with his stance of aloof detachment from any topic outside his narrow comfort zone, would seem provide a perfect opportunity for the two remaining candidates to define themselves. Such self-definition became even more crucial to the district after Charlie Harshfield’s late candidacy split the anti-Price vote.
In March, one-time councilman and current challenger Maury Goldberg offered three substantive postings, one each on the drug problem in neighborhoods, rental property inspections and tax abatements. These are much appreciated, and yet Maury continues to visible display signs of discomfort with the blogging format’s chief virtues of timeliness, flexibility and immediacy. It’s a fluid, adaptable medium, and it demands to be deployed in like fashion.
Charlie Harshfield – the last-minute, surprise candidate, and of the three, the one with the toughest of all name recognition nuts to crack – has oddly opted for silence in the blogosphere. A March 12 posting listed seven solid if briefly sketched platform goals, and generated a spirited discussion, but little else has followed. It is not unfair to suggest that Charlie needs 100% of the 3rd district’s progressives to have a chance of winning. Is this the way to find and retain them?
While Price’s muzzle is understandable – he’s comically prone to colossal linguistic gaffes and mutilates facts in the same fashion as psychotic cats torture mice – it defies our expectations of “reform” candidates to witness their bizarre hesitancy to regularly use some of the best tools available (i.e., the Internet) to articulate the need for reform.
All over town, “opposition” candidates are making the critical mistake of playing by “old school” rules. If these challengers wait too long to step outside the box, the results are going to be ugly, indeed.
As of the morning of April 2, 2007, here’s the rundown:
Days since last activity at Charlie Harshfield’s blog: 16.
Total posts since March 1: 3.
Days since last activity at Maury Goldberg’s blog: 4.
Total posts since March 1: 7.
Days since last activity at Steve Price’s blog: 26.
Total posts since March 1: 1.
Note: Maury Goldberg started his blog in October, 2005. Steve Price’s began in early January, 2007. Charlie Harshfield’s went up in Februart, 2007.
Sunday, April 01, 2007
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Quality time with Bix.
(Bluegill’s currently the go-to guy; I’m just taking up space in the paint and occasionally keeping the ball alive. Typing one handed is a pain – especially when you didn’t know how to type in the first place)
----
What better time than my current period of home recuperation following rotator cuff surgery to break out “Bix Restored” for an epic listening party?
“Bix Restored” gathers all surviving 78 rpm records made by jazz cornetist Bix Beiderbecke (1903-1931) along with more than a few alternate takes. The music is arranged chronologically by recording date, and takes up four 3-compact disc sets.
That’s right: 12 CDs.
From my vantage point astride the top floor recliner, and with frequent breaks for napping and the mandated three daily hours of physical therapy (ouch), I finished the final disc on Thursday evening.
With respect to jazz as an art form, Bix’s legacy is substantial, and dozens of professional musicologists and academics are fully capable of explaining why, sparing me the obligation other than to note that to a previous generation of his contemporaries, Bix symbolized the inventive, daring and hopelessly impractical artist, forced into artistic enslavement (see Whiteman, Paul) and then cruelly cut down in the prime of life.
The truth is somewhat more prosaic. Employment with Whiteman’s ponderous pop orchestra, with which Bix cut the majority of records, was in fact a plum position, highly paid and much sought. And, the sad reality of Bix’s self-destructive drinking habits – dying before the repeal of Prohibition of complications from alcoholism, Bix certainly ingested more than his share of rotgut – isn’t east to overlook even if he was universally adored by friends and fellow musicians.
In the end, the truth’s in the music. Bix’s full tone, clarity of phrasing and melodic lyricism usually carry the day even when accompanying musicians are clueless or Whiteman’s less adept arrangers clutter the soundscape with pomp and circumstance. In jazz parlance, he plays “cool” whether or not the music’s “hot.” He can’t help it.
Understandably, being dead for three quarters of a century and being known for skills on behalf of a uniquely American music that most Americans no longer acknowledge has its way of making millions of Americans forget all about you, with unpleasant ramifications for anyone who wants “to be remembered.”
However, as with cultural icons of previous eras, ranging from the Marx Brothers to the Berlin Wall, and from the Paul Reising Brewing Company to ordinance enforcement in New Albany, I’ll do my best to keep memories alive.
----
What better time than my current period of home recuperation following rotator cuff surgery to break out “Bix Restored” for an epic listening party?
“Bix Restored” gathers all surviving 78 rpm records made by jazz cornetist Bix Beiderbecke (1903-1931) along with more than a few alternate takes. The music is arranged chronologically by recording date, and takes up four 3-compact disc sets.
That’s right: 12 CDs.
From my vantage point astride the top floor recliner, and with frequent breaks for napping and the mandated three daily hours of physical therapy (ouch), I finished the final disc on Thursday evening.
With respect to jazz as an art form, Bix’s legacy is substantial, and dozens of professional musicologists and academics are fully capable of explaining why, sparing me the obligation other than to note that to a previous generation of his contemporaries, Bix symbolized the inventive, daring and hopelessly impractical artist, forced into artistic enslavement (see Whiteman, Paul) and then cruelly cut down in the prime of life.
The truth is somewhat more prosaic. Employment with Whiteman’s ponderous pop orchestra, with which Bix cut the majority of records, was in fact a plum position, highly paid and much sought. And, the sad reality of Bix’s self-destructive drinking habits – dying before the repeal of Prohibition of complications from alcoholism, Bix certainly ingested more than his share of rotgut – isn’t east to overlook even if he was universally adored by friends and fellow musicians.
In the end, the truth’s in the music. Bix’s full tone, clarity of phrasing and melodic lyricism usually carry the day even when accompanying musicians are clueless or Whiteman’s less adept arrangers clutter the soundscape with pomp and circumstance. In jazz parlance, he plays “cool” whether or not the music’s “hot.” He can’t help it.
Understandably, being dead for three quarters of a century and being known for skills on behalf of a uniquely American music that most Americans no longer acknowledge has its way of making millions of Americans forget all about you, with unpleasant ramifications for anyone who wants “to be remembered.”
However, as with cultural icons of previous eras, ranging from the Marx Brothers to the Berlin Wall, and from the Paul Reising Brewing Company to ordinance enforcement in New Albany, I’ll do my best to keep memories alive.
Friday, March 30, 2007
Limboland
Alfred Lubrano is a Columbia-trained journalist and author. He's also the son of a bricklayer. His book, Limbo: Blue-Collar Roots, White-Collar Dreams chronicles the feelings and experiences of those who move from one social class to another and the ever-present uneasiness of not fully belonging to either that accompanies that journey.
Having grown up with a shovel in one hand and a book in the other, it's a feeling I well understand. Certainly, it's one I've been struggling with more than usual as of late, owing to the fact that the notion of revitalization applies to one's person as much as it does to a city. Self-reinvention can be a tough business, especially if one leads a dualistic life to begin with.
It's likely a product of some logical fallacy whose name I don't have the energy to summon at the moment, but it occurs to me that the reverse is true as well. If my own revitalization process resembles that of a city, then the city's process must resemble that of mine, thousands of mes, all going through some sort of loosely collective, simultaneous experience, passing from one way of being into another.
Lubrano from Limbo:
Listen to Lubrano's interview with Liane Hansen from NPR's Weekend Edition Sunday, October 26, 2003, and let me know what you think.
Having grown up with a shovel in one hand and a book in the other, it's a feeling I well understand. Certainly, it's one I've been struggling with more than usual as of late, owing to the fact that the notion of revitalization applies to one's person as much as it does to a city. Self-reinvention can be a tough business, especially if one leads a dualistic life to begin with.
It's likely a product of some logical fallacy whose name I don't have the energy to summon at the moment, but it occurs to me that the reverse is true as well. If my own revitalization process resembles that of a city, then the city's process must resemble that of mine, thousands of mes, all going through some sort of loosely collective, simultaneous experience, passing from one way of being into another.
Lubrano from Limbo:
We didn't know it then, but those days were the start of a branching off-a redefining of what it means to be a workingman in our Italian-American family. Related by blood, we're separated by class, my father and I. Being the white-collar child of a blue-collar parent means being the hinge on the door between two ways of life. With one foot in the working class, the other in the middle class, people like me are Straddlers, at home in neither world, living a limbo life. It's the part of the American Dream you may have never heard about: the costs of social mobility. People pay with their anxiety about their place in life. It's a discomfort many never overcome.
What drove me to leave what I knew? Born blue-collar, I still never felt completely comfortable among the tough guys and anti-intellectual crowd who populated much of my neighborhood in deepest Brooklyn, part of a populous, insular working-class sector of commercial strips, small apartment buildings, and two-family homes. I never did completely fit in among the preppies and suburban royalty of Columbia, either. It's like that for Straddlers, who live with an uneasiness about their dual identity that can be hard to reconcile, no matter how far from the old neighborhood they eventually get. Ultimately, "it is very difficult to escape culturally from the class into which you are born," Paul Fussell's influential book Class: A Guide through the American Status System quotes George Orwell as saying. The grip is that tight. That's something Straddlers like me understand. There are parts of me that are proudly, stubbornly working class, despite my love of high tea, raspberry vinaigrette, and National Public Radio. Born with a street brawler's temperament, I possess an Ivy League circuit breaker to keep things in check. Still, I've been accused of having an edge, a chip I've balanced on my shoulder since my days in the old neighborhood.
Listen to Lubrano's interview with Liane Hansen from NPR's Weekend Edition Sunday, October 26, 2003, and let me know what you think.
Thursday, March 29, 2007
Playing the Percentages
In yesterday’s discussion of city finances, many tax abatement misconceptions were dispelled but the issue of Indiana’s 2% constitutional debt limit was again raised. And, again, it was asserted that New Albany had unconstitutionally surpassed it by financing a small portion of the Scribner Place development. Ever vigilant, our Senior Editor asked an extremely pertinent question:
the new albanian said...
Con-Dem wrote: We are constitutionally bound to a 2% debt limit, which we surpassed with Scribner Place. We hear this repeated all the time, but is that really true?
Con-Dem answered that it is.
The fact of the matter is that the City of New Albany didn’t issue any debt for Scribner Place. The New Albany Redevelopment Authority, as a legally recognized separate entity, did. The Redevelopment Authority’s 2% is calculated independently of the city’s, meaning that taken together they can issue debt equaling 4% of net assessed property value.
While that’s good information, it’s irrelevant in this and most cases of Indiana public finance. The bonds issued were done so as part of a lease structure, a perfectly legal and commonplace financing method not bound by the 2% debt limit. The truth is, Scribner Place financing doesn’t affect our debt limit at all.
As the State Board of Tax Commissioners explained in a preliminary fair market value report to an Indiana General Assembly study committee in 1996:
In our case, the city’s portion of the lease rental payments are covered with Economic Development Income Tax funds, with property taxing authority used only as a backup mechanism in order to secure a better interest rate.
In a discussion of TIF districts, Ball State’s Center for Economic and Community Development explains the lease arrangements thusly:
Lease rental bonds are a fundamental method of local government finance across the country and have been since the 80s. Their use gives municipalities flexibility to finance projects while creating more attractive situations for investors.
As the Tax Commission clarifies:
With weight loss inducing regularity, generally accepted modern practice has been met with alarmism and rumor mongering in New Albany. It’s difficult to tell exactly how such rumors get started, but it’s easy enough to figure out who preys upon the fears of those factions that insist on their perpetuance.
In a supposed statement of his core values, 3rd District Council Member Steve Price let’s us know that he was the one who informed citizens “how we by-passed the 2% constitutional debt limitation” in financing Scribner Place as if it were some sort of conspiracy he’d personally uncovered. Mind you, he’s the same guy who once told a room full of constituents that we were spending all of our EDIT money on Scribner Place. We’re actually spending less than 10%.
Given that important decisions need to be made concerning the other 90%, it might be best not to rely on 100% ignorance and those who think that's all we can do.
the new albanian said...
Con-Dem wrote: We are constitutionally bound to a 2% debt limit, which we surpassed with Scribner Place. We hear this repeated all the time, but is that really true?
Con-Dem answered that it is.
The fact of the matter is that the City of New Albany didn’t issue any debt for Scribner Place. The New Albany Redevelopment Authority, as a legally recognized separate entity, did. The Redevelopment Authority’s 2% is calculated independently of the city’s, meaning that taken together they can issue debt equaling 4% of net assessed property value.
While that’s good information, it’s irrelevant in this and most cases of Indiana public finance. The bonds issued were done so as part of a lease structure, a perfectly legal and commonplace financing method not bound by the 2% debt limit. The truth is, Scribner Place financing doesn’t affect our debt limit at all.
As the State Board of Tax Commissioners explained in a preliminary fair market value report to an Indiana General Assembly study committee in 1996:
Local governments in Indiana, like most local governments throughout the nation, rely on the local property tax base to generate revenue to repay debt issued to finance capital improvement projects. Local governments can sell general obligation (GO) bonds which are supported by the full, faith and credit, or unlimited taxing power, of the entire taxing unit. But there are state constitutional and statutory provisions that restrict the ability of local governments to issue GO debt in Indiana.
Article 13, Section 1 of the Indiana Constitution limits the total principal indebtedness of any political subdivision to no more than 2 percent of the net assessed valuation of taxable property within the taxing unit. The debt limitation applies to 2 percent of net assessed valuation, not 2 percent of true tax value. The constitutional debt limit applies to each municipal corporation individually, and not in the aggregate to municipal corporations which may cover the same area or include the same taxpayers. This has led to the establishment of many overlapping municipal corporations (e.g., school, jail) and special taxing units (e.g., special districts such as fire, library, parks and recreation, sanitation, and redevelopment authorities) that use the same property tax base as the general government to finance capital improvements.
Local government property-tax backed debt in Indiana consists primarily of non-GO bonds because of these debt limits. Most local property-tax backed bonds sold in Indiana are lease rental bonds. During 1992-1995, more than $2.3 billion in lease rental bonds were sold, compared to only $218 million in unlimited tax (GO) bonds. Lease rental bonds account for 88 percent of all of bonds sold by local entities in the state. Most general governmental and school corporation lease rental bonds are repaid directly from lease rental payments that are raised from property tax revenues.
Lease rental bonds are popular with local governments precisely because they are not subject to the 2 percent debt limit.
In our case, the city’s portion of the lease rental payments are covered with Economic Development Income Tax funds, with property taxing authority used only as a backup mechanism in order to secure a better interest rate.
In a discussion of TIF districts, Ball State’s Center for Economic and Community Development explains the lease arrangements thusly:
When other tax revenues are pledged to enhance a TIF financing, Indiana constitutional debt limit restrictions often dictate that the financing be structured as a lease. Under this structure, a separate entity known as a redevelopment authority is created by ordinance of the unit's legislative body. The redevelopment authority then issues bonds, constructs the project, and leases it back to the redevelopment commission. The commission then pays lease rentals to the authority from TIF and the other pledged revenues in an amount sufficient to pay the authority bonds.
Lease rental bonds are a fundamental method of local government finance across the country and have been since the 80s. Their use gives municipalities flexibility to finance projects while creating more attractive situations for investors.
As the Tax Commission clarifies:
Unlike most lease rental bonds sold throughout the nation, Indiana lease rental bonds do not contain an annual appropriation-out clause enabling the government to annually withhold debt service payments.
In effect, such lease rental bonds are structured as synthetic GO bonds. This provides Indiana lease rental bonds with two additional layers of repayment security that is absent most other lease rental bonds in the nation. The additional layers of security have been fine tuned over the years so that, research shows, investors favorably view Indiana lease rental bonds since they exhibit interest costs no different than GO bonds.
With weight loss inducing regularity, generally accepted modern practice has been met with alarmism and rumor mongering in New Albany. It’s difficult to tell exactly how such rumors get started, but it’s easy enough to figure out who preys upon the fears of those factions that insist on their perpetuance.
In a supposed statement of his core values, 3rd District Council Member Steve Price let’s us know that he was the one who informed citizens “how we by-passed the 2% constitutional debt limitation” in financing Scribner Place as if it were some sort of conspiracy he’d personally uncovered. Mind you, he’s the same guy who once told a room full of constituents that we were spending all of our EDIT money on Scribner Place. We’re actually spending less than 10%.
Given that important decisions need to be made concerning the other 90%, it might be best not to rely on 100% ignorance and those who think that's all we can do.
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
New Albany is Broke (with plenty of money)
While 3rd district obstructionist Steve Price is busy holding up efforts to use an EDIT fund surplus to pave streets, The Tribune asked how much New Albany could pave if CM Jeff Gahan's proposal to add $500,000 of that surplus to existing funds were enacted. The answer: an estimated 18 miles.
The City receives approximately $1.5 million in EDIT funds each year. Outside of the small Scribner Place payment of $137,500, the pittance used to set Economic Development Director Paul Wheatley up for failure, and a tiny $20,000 committment to the Kentuckiana Regional Planning and Development Agency, New Albany has over $1.2 million in economic development funds at its disposal per annum, outside of the current surplus. One drain on those funds, debt service on a downtown parking garage, will end soon. The misguided jail bond is paid off already.
Mr. Wheatley has at various times provided some solid thinking on the subject of how the money might be used only to have the Council respond to his well-researched ideas with a sucking force normally saved for rare earth magnets.
In addition to Wheatley's sensible requests for funds last year to be used as a match from the City to fund a downtown low interest loan pool in coordination with local banks and the Urban Enterprise Zone and to provide preliminary design studies on vacant or deteriorating historic buildings in our downtown in an effort to encourage their rehabilitation, there are a host of other ways the money could be used.
For perspective, here's how $1.2 million might be used in a given year:
• Pay for Scribner Place eight more times
• Pave about 20 miles of streets
• Buy a city block of houses and give them away for rehabilitation
• Provide 240 years of education at IU Southeast
• Pour roughly 5 miles of sidewalks
• Award 120 historic rehabilitation grants of $10,000 each
• Subsidize the total annual interest on $18 million in home mortgages at 6.5%
We have or will soon have the money without raising taxes one cent. All we have to do is pick one and pay for it.
Other ideas?
The City receives approximately $1.5 million in EDIT funds each year. Outside of the small Scribner Place payment of $137,500, the pittance used to set Economic Development Director Paul Wheatley up for failure, and a tiny $20,000 committment to the Kentuckiana Regional Planning and Development Agency, New Albany has over $1.2 million in economic development funds at its disposal per annum, outside of the current surplus. One drain on those funds, debt service on a downtown parking garage, will end soon. The misguided jail bond is paid off already.
Mr. Wheatley has at various times provided some solid thinking on the subject of how the money might be used only to have the Council respond to his well-researched ideas with a sucking force normally saved for rare earth magnets.
In addition to Wheatley's sensible requests for funds last year to be used as a match from the City to fund a downtown low interest loan pool in coordination with local banks and the Urban Enterprise Zone and to provide preliminary design studies on vacant or deteriorating historic buildings in our downtown in an effort to encourage their rehabilitation, there are a host of other ways the money could be used.
For perspective, here's how $1.2 million might be used in a given year:
• Pay for Scribner Place eight more times
• Pave about 20 miles of streets
• Buy a city block of houses and give them away for rehabilitation
• Provide 240 years of education at IU Southeast
• Pour roughly 5 miles of sidewalks
• Award 120 historic rehabilitation grants of $10,000 each
• Subsidize the total annual interest on $18 million in home mortgages at 6.5%
We have or will soon have the money without raising taxes one cent. All we have to do is pick one and pay for it.
Other ideas?
Tuesday, March 27, 2007
My esteemed colleague will be along shortly to guide you ...
On Sunday, I devoted some time to straightening NA Confidential office, so to speak, rearranging the blog in the parent company’s new modular layout format. It’s easier to use, and it looks better. There’ll be a few more changes when I get around to it.
On Monday, all my unused drafts went up on the marquee as posts. That’s a signal to Bluegill to get ready for action, since he’ll be performing chief editor’s duty for a few days.
In turn, that’s because today I’ll be having outpatient surgery to repair a torn rotator cuff in my left shoulder, something that has been in need of attention for quite a while. Too many curve balls? Too many progressive pints sounds more like it.
I’m quite eager and willing to follow my surgeon’s orders to the letter and get the rehab under way so there’ll still be a bicycling season for me this year – even if it doesn’t start until June. I’ve been grounded off the bike since January, and it’s just depressing having to drive to work every day. People simply shouldn’t have to do it.
So, I’m taking a break from my various jobs and hobbies, and turning over the weathered soapbox to my co-editor. Take it away, Jeff …
On Monday, all my unused drafts went up on the marquee as posts. That’s a signal to Bluegill to get ready for action, since he’ll be performing chief editor’s duty for a few days.
In turn, that’s because today I’ll be having outpatient surgery to repair a torn rotator cuff in my left shoulder, something that has been in need of attention for quite a while. Too many curve balls? Too many progressive pints sounds more like it.
I’m quite eager and willing to follow my surgeon’s orders to the letter and get the rehab under way so there’ll still be a bicycling season for me this year – even if it doesn’t start until June. I’ve been grounded off the bike since January, and it’s just depressing having to drive to work every day. People simply shouldn’t have to do it.
So, I’m taking a break from my various jobs and hobbies, and turning over the weathered soapbox to my co-editor. Take it away, Jeff …
Monday, March 26, 2007
Well, at least he has that in common with Jerry Seinfeld.
As of Tuesday morning, it will have been three full weeks since the previously effusive 3rd district incumbent has had anything at all to say at his “My Peculiar Vision” blog.
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In unrelated news, Wal-Mart says that a Chinese tanker vessel’s recent grounding on an uncharted Pacific atoll has led to critical shortages of cheaply outsourced political clichés. The world’s largest retailer suggests that politicians in need of an immediate fix should consider endlessly recycling previously used clichés until new shipments arrive from India.
In unrelated news, Wal-Mart says that a Chinese tanker vessel’s recent grounding on an uncharted Pacific atoll has led to critical shortages of cheaply outsourced political clichés. The world’s largest retailer suggests that politicians in need of an immediate fix should consider endlessly recycling previously used clichés until new shipments arrive from India.
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